


for the lady is risen

by thistleandthorn



Series: the ice maiden of winterfell [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alive Starks (ASoIaF), Attempting Plot, Catelyn Stark's A+ Parenting, Child Death, Established Relationship, Excessive and Unnecessary Use of (Parentheses), F/M, It Gets Non-Linear Y'all, Mainly as a Part of my TEDTalk on how S8 Could Have Worked, POV Sansa Stark, POV Tyrion Lannister, Past Abuse, Sad smut, Sansa Stark is Elizabeth I, Secret Relationship, Sexual Content, Shamelessly Resurrecting the RedWedding!Starks, Still Mostly Sanrion Pining tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:54:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 25
Words: 64,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24226921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thistleandthorn/pseuds/thistleandthorn
Summary: “So, you are Queen now?”(There’s something in the way Robb says it, the way the words form in his mouth, the way they hang in the air.)Arya stopped, “Are you alright, Sansa?”(It’s a flutter, she shouldn’t, she shouldn’t, she can already feel the weight of Arya’s disappointment and shame bubbles up but who else—)“I think Robb means to become king again.”--The Starks, against all odds, survived the Red Wedding. Six years after the Great War, they have returned to the North to reclaim their home. Sansa Stark, Queen in the North, might have something to say about that.
Relationships: Arya Stark & Sansa Stark, Arya Stark/Gendry Waters (mentioned), Catelyn Tully Stark & Sansa Stark, Everyone & Sansa Stark & Tyrion Lannister lol, Jon Snow & Sansa Stark, Jon Stark/Original Male Character (mentioned), Robb Stark & Sansa Stark, Talisa Maegyr & Sansa Stark, Talisa Maegyr/Robb Stark, Tyrion Lannister & Catelyn Tully Stark, Tyrion Lannister & Jon Snow, Tyrion Lannister & Sansa Stark, Tyrion Lannister/Sansa Stark
Series: the ice maiden of winterfell [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1850377
Comments: 1074
Kudos: 628





	1. prologue

Three figures walked quietly through the winter town. The two taller figures were moving by memory, starting and restarting, upon missing a turn or finding a new building in their way. They had started out from a roadside inn that morning. It had been a long trudge up the kingsroad and the moon was high in the sky by the time they reached the outskirts of the village. The village glinted with the dusting of crisp spring snows. The crunch of their boots along the ground made the young woman with them nervous. She had asked multiple times throughout the day if they had heard this branch crack or that bush rustle to the annoyance of her companions.

The trio paused in an alley. A tavern across the narrow street was exploding with drunken laughter but this side was undisturbed, the alley protected by the overhanging eave of the tall building to its right and the slanting roof of the tannery to its left. 

“We could stop,” the older woman said, “There’s not much to be done at this time of night. That woman said they opened the castle for petitions in the morning.” 

“No,” the man said firmly, “we’ll be recognized.” 

The younger woman shivered, “Are you sure, Robb? It’s been six years—” She was cut off by the sudden flash of a knife against her throat and the curl of gloved fingers against her mouth.

The man went to draw his dagger but found his arm caught by another gloved hand. Another arm swung around to grip his mouth, he tasted leather and metal. He looked, panicked, to the older woman. She was similarly restrained though making a valiant effort to struggle free. Caught by shadows. 

From his left, he heard a female’s voice: “You are arrested, in the name of Queen Sansa, First of Her Name, Queen in the North.”  
His eyes flicked to try to find the source of the voice. A diminutive figure, dressed in black, who when pressed against the shadow of the building they had been huddling under, had been nearly indistinguishable from air. The woman stepped away. He could make out the barest hint of a dark braid as she turned to gesture to their captors.

The trio was half-carried, half-dragged through a maze of back alleys and side streets until they reached the outer wall of Winterfell. Anxiety thrummed through the man’s chest. Home and yet not. At least they were being led to Sansa.

The leader of their party, the small woman with the braid, strode forward. Her face caught the light—she was pale with a sharp nose. She looked familiar but he felt as if his memory were a painting that someone had drawn their hand across, smearing the subject. 

The woman called up, “Open up, Selwyn.” 

That voice. 

The gates groaned open. His guard slammed his fist into his back, causing him to stumble forward, through the gates. He was home.


	2. it's been years since i saw you, i've learned how to live/and the love's back in swing and the lady has risen

The sun had barely yawned over Winterfell when Sansa was awoken by the squawking of a raven at her window. Bran’s communications were rare, but they were all delivered the same way: a bird at dawn. Sansa was startled awake. She had fallen asleep at her desk again; another habit for Jeyne to fuss over. _(It’s easier to work through the night, she hates lying in bed, waiting, waiting, waiting. She always feels like she needs to be going somewhere, doing something with the fact that she can still breathe.)_

She opened the window for the raven, unfurled the scrap note. She recognized Bran’s handwriting. For all his magical ability, Bran had never had the opportunity to truly practice his letters beyond childhood and his penmanship was hardly legible. She squinted to make it out:

‘The pack survives.’

She frowned. Bran’s letters were all like this, cryptic and half-done. Sometimes encouragement, sometimes warning, indecipherable until it was almost too late. Sighing, she dropped the scrap onto her vanity and called her maid to help ready her for the day.

\--

She was interrupted at her mid-day meal by a spy report that three strangers are headed to Winterfell, that they have asked discreet but unusual questions.

\--

A few hours later, in the middle of another tense discussion of her marriage prospects, another report came to her via a breathless innkeeper-spy that the three strangers look eerily like her brother and his lost queen.

\--

She sent Arya after them, more to give her sister something to do than anything else. It was probably nothing. She preferred her spies overactive even if it meant she had to sift through the truth in their reports herself. _(“Whatever you don’t know is usually what kills you,” Petyr says. She tries to ignore him, but he is always there, sitting in her chair, reading her papers, lazing in the library.)_

She had settled in her chamber to read the latest stack of marriage proposals when the distinctive tapping of her sister’s knock interrupted her quiet. “Come in.”

Arya entered, “I have brought back the three you requested.”

Sansa barely looked up, “And?”

“You better come, Sansa.”

Sansa finally tore her attention away from the document in front of her. _(How many minor princes did Dorne have anyway?)_ Arya’s face was pale and drawn. The room was suddenly heavy. She felt it. The significance of tonight, that rush before everything changes, the moment a rain cloud is spotted before the hurricane. They have been here before.

_(There is a moment before Arya continues that Sansa wants to shriek, ‘No no no,’ she wants to stay suspended forever, there’s only so much that she can take.)_

“The innkeeper was right.”

\--

They were taken through a kaleidoscope of the back rooms of Winterfell before being shoved in—where were they? Robb tried to remember—Bran’s room? It certainly looked different. Bran’s things were no longer here. Obviously. Bran sat on the Iron Throne now. It was clearly in use, the hearth lit, the bed made but—

Their guards shuffled in Talisa. Her eyes were wide and fearful. His mother followed, still struggling to get free. The woman who had led them there entered last. As she stepped into the firelight, Robb lost his breath—

“Arya?” His mother breathed.

It was Arya. But full-grown now. Taller, thought not by much, her shoulders broader even under her cloak. She was dressed in men’s clothes, tall boots and a wool jacket. Her eyes are what he remembered, grey like their father’s.

Arya frowned, “So the reports were true.”

She strode to Robb. “Arya, it’s Robb—”

She reached out and cupped her hands around his cheeks. Tears welled in Robb’s eyes—wild little Arya. He wanted to launch forward and press kisses all over her cheeks, hug her, but his guard was still restraining him—“Arya, I missed you so much—” Arya leaned in to embrace and Robb tried to open his chest to accept her—

She tugged at his jawline instead. Her fingers curled around the nape of his neck and pulled there too. “Ah! What was that for?”

Arya stepped back appraisingly then went to their mother. Catelyn was weeping now, “Arya! It’s me!”

She repeated the exercise on their mother and then Talisa, “Strange.”

She bent to examine Talisa, “Your name?” Talisa cast a terrified look to Robb, “T-Talisa Stark.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Arya said, more to herself than Talisa.

She paused for a moment, she gestured to the guards, “Leave us. And if I hear a word of this breathed to anyone, you know what will happen.”

“Yes, captain.” Robb felt the pressure on his arms release as the guards lumbered out.

As soon as she was free, Catelyn scrambled to Arya, “Oh, my love. My girl.”

She embraced her; Arya’s arms went instinctually around Catelyn’s waist. Robb joined them, wrapping his arms around them both, like he remembered Ned doing when he was young. They were all so alive and warm. Talisa pressed in on his other side. It was like a veil being lifted, the world was a little brighter, a little sharper. When they finally released, Robb scrubbed his face of tears.

Arya spoke first, “I need to get Sansa. Sansa—”

“Where is she?” Catelyn was desperate.

“Her chamber, I’ll go. Wait, I’ll go. I’ll go,” Arya squeezed her mother’s hand and released, “I’ll be back, just a moment.”

\--

Sansa peppered Arya with questions as they raced down the hall.

“How do you know it’s them and not—”

Arya fixed her with a hard stare, “Some things a girl just _knows_.”

When they reached the room, Sansa stopped, “I don’t know—”

_(It’s all going to change. The one possibility she had never foreseen, she could never have planned for—)_

Arya gripped her hand, “Together.”

Sansa nodded.

Arya opened the door.

\--

It was everything and nothing. It was all Sansa could do to keep breathing. Her mother, her _mother_ , her Robb, are around her. The room buzzed. She was crying, sobbing. The past eight years feel like a blink and an indescribable odyssey.

_(Their loss was her secret name and now it’s being scrubbed away. Her name, what is it—)_

There’s another woman there—it must be Talisa. Robb led her to Sansa and Sansa laughed, almost hysterically.

“How? How is this possible?”

The three of them overlapped in telling their tale. How Frey’s men had moved too early, caused a commotion rather than an organized attack, how they had managed to fight their way out, how they had found each other bleeding and broken in the woods, how they had fled, how they watched their army slaughtered, how Talisa had booked a voyage to Volantis, refusing to give birth in a land against them. There was no mention of what happened to her child after that.

_(It’s automatic, she can’t control this, that even in this overwhelming, suffocating moment, her mind is turning, turning, turning. What is wrong with her?)_

“You must need something to eat? Are you hungry?” _(Always remember your courtesies.)_

She laughed again, she was starting to sound mad except that Robb and Catelyn and Talisa and Arya are all laughing with her, “Arya, go wake Jeyne.”

_(What’s my name? What’s my name?)_

\--

When Jeyne arrived, Sansa had to prevent her from screaming. After much calming, Jeyne disappeared with Arya and returned with a veritable feast. Cold chicken, hard cheese, sweet dark bread, two flagons of good wine. Robb pulled out the long sideboard in the corner to the center of the room and Sansa sat back to watch them dine.

They talked and they talked and they talked. And they stared for long moments at each other, not quite believing their existence. They had everything and nothing to say. Arya talked about her naval adventures but not Braavos, not the Night King. Sansa spoke about Bran; she did not mention Rickon. Things would need to be incremental.

_(She wishes she was different but it’s a habit. She doesn’t want to, she really doesn’t, she wants to sit and enjoy this absolute miracle but she can feel the frost stiffen her face and straighten her spine. She plays her little game. What is the worse reason that they could have chosen this moment to come? She imagines a broom and tries to sweep the thought away but once it’s rooted, it begins to grow, she pursues it. She turns her head and mint burns her throat.)_

“So, you are Queen now?”

_(There’s something in the way Robb says it, the way the words form in his mouth, the way they hang in the air.)_

She said something back, some affirmation.

_(There’s other things that they say, that Robb says, that her lady mother says, that his wife says, innocent on their own: ‘I see Winterfell looks different.’ ‘Bran and you, both monarchs.’ Etc., etc., etc., it builds and builds and builds.)_

She sensed that everyone was growing tired and so she offered them space in the East Wing. The East Wing, smaller than the other parts of the castle, easy to isolate. “We will not announce it yet, I think, I need to think, it will need to be secret for now—”

She, Arya, and Jeyne led them to the East Wing, the rooms had already been prepared for the delegation arriving the next day. “I will have Jeyne take you to break your fast in my solar tomorrow.”

Her mother’s face was radiant, “Oh Sansa—”

_(She doesn’t want to leave but she needs space, she needs to think.)_

When she left Robb and Talisa, Robb stopped her with an arm on her shoulder, “I’ve thought of this for so long, Sansa, it’s so good to finally be able to bring Talisa home, to _be_ home.”

She smiled at him, “I missed you, too, Robb.”

 _(It’s then that she knows. She has felt it herself, that desperate longing. A Stark belongs to the North, they are connected to it, a part of it, so embedded in its every rock and crag that it feels like they_ are _it. She knows exactly what he means. A Stark has always led the North.)_

Jeyne returned to her room, yawning, and Arya walked her back to her own chambers.

Arya stopped, “Are you alright, Sansa?”

_(It’s a flutter, she shouldn’t, she shouldn’t, she can already feel the weight of Arya’s disappointment and shame bubbles up but who else—)_

“I think Robb means to become king again.”


	3. have i nothing to give you, i'm cold in your head

Sansa kept her word and the following morning, she sat at breakfast with her mother, brother, and good sister. The table in her solar was laden with fruits, fresh bread, and pots of honey and jam. In the cold grey of morning, they seemed more strangers now, travel-worn, still in dusty, plain dress, hair lank without washing. They looked _old._

Her mother attempted conversation at the beginning of the meal, “The wine was quite good at dinner last night.”

Sansa almost wanted to laugh at the triviality. She remembered her courtesies instead, “It’s imported from Dorne. Part of our Southern trade deal.”

Robb looked particularly uncomfortable, exchanging a glance with his wife, he started, “You have many trade deals—”

He was cut off by Jeyne’s entrance. She curtsied, “I am sorry, Your Grace, but there is correspondence from Lord Tyrion.”

Sansa reached for the letter, suddenly conscious of her own imperiousness.

_(When did she make the shift from girl to queen? It was sometime after Petyr and sometime before the Long Night, a time these people at her table will and could never understand. She wants to be kind, she wants to be conciliatory but she cannot keep a voice that sounds like Petyr and Tyrion and Varys and Cersei all at once from whispering in her ear that they want what she has built. That her brother and mother are threats that must be dealt with. Her father would be ashamed, and all those voices would be so proud.)_

Aware of her audience, she broke the seal _(she usually studies the seal first, the little hand pressed into wax, she does not understand her own fascination with it)_ and read the letter. It is simple:

_My dearest Sansa_ —she skimmed the rest.

_(Tyrion represents a long-lasting, well-concealed truth about her, one she doesn’t think about often, one that hums in the background of her life. She’s only ever told him once. No matter what Arya insinuates, she does not crave cruelty.)_

“Lord Tyrion expects to be here by this evening. He writes from Castle Cerwyn.” She folded the rest of the letter, catching only a piece of a word that looks like ‘darling.’ She turned to Jeyne, “Make sure a bath is prepared. I have already had the Maester select some books, but the candles may need replacing.”

Jeyne curtsied and hurried away.

Catelyn watched with great interest, “Lord Tyrion is a frequent visitor?”

Sansa sensed the barb in the question, “He is the Hand to my brother the king. It is his annual visit.”

“He is a Lannister,” Robb interjected. It had been a long while since Sansa heard that particular objection against Tyrion.

_(It hits her like thunder that the war has never ended for them, that the last Westerosi words they ever heard were from the Lannisters before a knife was sunk into their countrymen’s breast. There has never been the closure of a coronation or a kiss pressed to their hands at the moment of death. She feels terribly sad for them and terribly tired of explaining things that should be known to the whole world by now. A part of her mind that still churns over every detail of the Dragon Queen’s motives wonders if that was Daenerys’ problem the whole time—that Westeros’ old conflicts had and would never die for her.)_

“He is Hand of the Six Kingdoms,” she repeated firmly. _(Surely, she should be able to tell her mother, her family, that he is more than that.)_ “Bran’s trust is enough.”

Robb looked like he wanted to object more but was silenced by a severe look from their mother.

Talisa tried to salvage the meal with an awkward, “I heard you enjoyed sewing.”

\--

The day passed quickly. The kingdom still trod on. Sansa departed after breakfast and gave Jeyne strict instructions to contain her family’s activity to the sealed East Wing and to, for the sake of all the Gods, find them some new clothes. She carried on her routine, hearing petitions in the morning and retiring with her council to their chambers to refine a drafted proposal on sea trade that she intended to present to Tyrion. _(An unpleasant surprise for him, no doubt, but necessary if they are to gain any movement on lumber prices.)_ She made an effort to appear for the midday meal with her mother and brother, but it was as stiff as the morning and she felt a stab of regret even as she escaped to her solar. She made no similar attempt for the evening meal instead ensuring that Arya (who she noted with some triumph had failed to appear for both meals, off training and then the Gods know where for the rest of the day) was present.

\--

Sansa ensconced herself at her desk. There was still the work of the kingdom to be done, the never-ending slush of reports and correspondence and grievances and marriage offers. It was easier to focus on this, all these details that she had memorized and then repeated to herself every night as she lay alone in the dark. The price of lumber exports, the rate the merchants in White Harbor were charging for rope, the amendments to Lord Manderley’s new agriculture program, the various marriage alliances she had painstakingly nurtured between her lords and others outside their tiny kingdom. That last bit had been Tyrion’s suggestion, a private counsel between friends, that it might be beneficial for the North to strengthen their position through a marriage network that extended far beyond their modest borders.

She wrote and wrote until her hand cramped and ached. Finally, she looked up at her sputtering candle, she realized the sun had slipped from her window view and that her chamber was rife with shadows. She did not enjoy night. Most who knew her assumed that her aversion came from her time with the Boltons, the inevitable screaming nightmares were Ramsay’s fault. Lately though, she had dreamed the most of Blackwater Bay and Cersei’s wine-foul breath and Sandor Clegane’s body falling to ash.

She organized the last of her papers _(She acquired the habit from Petyr though whenever she thought about it that way, she promptly told herself that this was the best way to do things, that she would have had to learn how to keep track of the hundreds of papers she held in her possession somehow from someone and she tried to push down the fact that sometimes, in tough moments, when presented with a knotty problem, she still wished for Petyr, who always seemed so sure up until the moment Arya pressed her blade into his neck, and had made her feel befriended and important and—)_ when she heard the snick of her door being open. It was Arya.

Arya held a bowl of stew thick with beef and carrots and turnips. Sansa tried to smile but she could feel how forced it must look. Arya crossed the room and placed the bowl in front of her, “Eat.”

Sansa attempted to smile again, took the proffered spoon, and bent dutifully over her bowl, “Gods, this is good.”

“The cook used that wine that Lord Bronn had shipped with his trade delegation last month.”

Sansa nodded, “He has good taste.”

Arya made a non-committal noise. The sisters sat in quiet. Sansa had grown used to Arya’s stillness and unblinking stares and comfort in complete silence. Sansa, who spent all day talking and talking and talking, appreciated it when Arya is here, that a visit with her sister can be a justified respite from her own voice. This night, though, Arya broke the hush, “Would we be friends if there were no wars?”

Sansa started, then sighed, “I don’t think so. I would have married Joffrey and become queen and there wouldn’t have been much time to do much else, I suppose. You would have been shipped off to some other noble house. We probably would have become like Aunt Lysa and Mother, not seeing each other for years on end, and not really knowing each other.”

“We don’t see each other for years on end.”

Sansa let that statement sit there for a moment, “Yes but we’re just different than we were.”

She cannot say she hasn’t pondered the same thing. She wondered if their relationship has grown and flourished because they restarted it as adults, loyalty and camaraderie shooting up out of the scorched earth of their childhood, tended by shared trauma and violence.

Arya settled back and Sansa finished her stew in quiet. As she pushed the bowl away from her, she unintentionally locked eyes with Arya. They have the same eyes. Their coloring is so different, the shape of their bodies, but their eyes have always been the same, “I don’t want you to do something to Robb or Mother that you will regret.”

That hurt. Like a knife wound. Arya had never shed her wariness of Sansa’s ruthlessness, the part of her sister she could never truly understand. _(Although Sansa maintains it is the same as Arya’s list, her list is simply different, a list of political goals rather than individual names, they both have crossed off their lists to the exclusion of all other happiness. It reminds her of the Hound in eternal pursuit of his brother, Petyr and her and her mother’s ghost, Daenerys and whatever she actually wanted.)_

Sansa didn’t know how to respond so she doesn’t. She toyed with her pen instead.

“It might be something to consider, Sansa—”

Sansa’s head snapped up, “What do you mean?” The anger she had pressed down with figures and policy coursed through her suddenly like a river.

“You could be free—”

“Do you think Robb should be king?”

Arya looked taken aback at that, “No, actually, I rather thought that you would not want to be queen any longer.”

Sansa narrowed her eyes, “And why would you think that?”

“I just want you to be happy, Sansa, there are things that you could do that you can’t now.”

Years of rule had sharpened Sansa’s rage to points, “Like what?”

“Marry Tyrion.” Of all the things Sansa expected Arya to say, it was not that.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You will not marry him as a Queen. You could marry him as a Lady of the north—”

It feels like she cannot breathe, like being squeezed in a vice grip, she cut off Arya with a sharp, “I will never marry again.”

Arya snorted, “Technically, you wouldn’t be.”

Sansa felt like flame was consuming her belly and uses that power to stand, peering down at her sister, “You think that I would leave all this,” she gestured to her chamber, the grand bed, the tapestries she had commissioned, the books of law by her bedside, her chests of gowns, all the trappings and tools of her queenship, “for what? Casterly Rock? A life in the south? I built this kingdom. I bled for this kingdom. I am its queen and it will be the only husband I ever have again.”

She has crossed to a place she can never return. She will never marry again. The words ran through her mind even as she glares at her sister. _(She will never marry, she will never marry, she tries them on, she wants to say it again to see how it feels.)_ She sat again, suddenly feeling awkward.

Arya shrugged, “Alright.”

There is one thing that she cannot stand about Arya and it is her ability to be nonchalant about prodding the bear of Sansa’s emotions. Sansa shifted in her seat, “Alright.”

Arya stood and made for the door, turning as she places her hand on the door, “You will be a queen that history remembers: good and wise and clever and kind. The one who freed the North and made us great. I will do what I can to keep your crown, but I will not do it at the price of our House.”

“I understand.” She was not lying, she truly did.

With Arya gone, she was left alone. Sansa glanced down at her desk. She returned to work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: the scene between Arya and Sansa was the first one I wrote for this and everything else is built on that interaction.   
> :)


	4. but you're burning in mine, come to rest off the train

She received word of Tyrion’s arrival just as she signed the resolution on naval trade. She smirked inwardly. _(Poor, poor Tyrion.)_

It had begun to rain after dark, a chilling spring downpour that hammered at the windows and wailed like widows through the trees. An inauspicious beginning to a visit, she could not help but think, as she stood, protected under the covered walkway, watching Tyrion’s men help him dismount. His hood was pulled far over his eyes and she could not read is expression as he approached. 

He bowed, “Your Grace.” 

She curtsied, “My Lord.” 

\--

They had developed a routine the past six years of visits. After the formal greeting and the dispatching of his men to a hot meal and their quarters, Tyrion retired to his chambers to bathe and Sansa went to prepare for bed. She had lived in Winterfell long enough to sense when the small commotion of Tyrion’s arrival had settled back into castle sleep. Once she was sure, she left, looping past the library to Tyrion’s chambers and let herself in. 

Tyrion’s back was turned to her, still rested against the broad back of the soaking tub she had Jeyne send up. He seemed almost asleep, the water still steaming and fragrant. Trying not to disturb him, she slipped her way to the tub, kneeling beside it. It is only then that Tyrion turned his head, giving her a slow smile, “Your Grace.” 

She reached across his body for the various oils propped on the lip of the tub. She poured some onto her palm, rubbing her hands together until the oil was warm, before spreading it across his shoulders. He leaned forward instinctually _(It is this she loves the most, she thinks, how much it feels in these moments that they simply are who they are, the worries and stresses and regrets of the world seem to recede to just them, like what might have been without their names and their countries between_ _them)_ and she massaged his neck and back, thumbing the notches in his spine, the wide wings of his shoulder blades, the tendons in his nape that are so tight they could snap. 

He groaned _(it’s a sound that settles in her belly and she feels an ache already beginning between her thighs, she loves this too, that she can still feel something there, that she knows pleasure and can claim it)_ , “Is this how you treat all your guests at Winterfell?” 

She pressed a kiss to the shell of his ear, “Hmmm. How do you think I got so far with Iron Bank?” 

He laughed, a happy, genuine sound. _(It's so rare and so precious and she wants to drink it from his lips.)_ She moved from his ear, placing delicate kisses down his neck, “How are your legs?” 

“My Gods, my wife is a worrier.” _(He still says that sometimes and she never questions it. She thinks he means it as a jape, but it feels more like a burden.)_

Sansa did not respond, choosing instead to reach below and find his legs beneath the water. His strangled moan was confirmation enough. She worked his legs, circling her fingers under his knees and at the soft indent at his hips. It took them a long time, she marveled, to get to this moment. He never liked to admit weakness or that his bones pained him. It had taken her two years for him to allow her to help. 

_(She never acknowledges when he sometimes weeps at her care, he never cries loudly, a single tear, a tender expression, a hiccupped sigh. It makes her feel guilty, that she playacts at dutiful wife but she does it anyway because she knows there’s no one else and Gods help her because she wants there to be no one else and because she knows about the persistent pain in his crooked spine, she feels like she consumes him sometimes and there’s tremendous shame in her gluttony.)_

Their reunion was slow and intentional. Her hands inevitably wound their way to his cock and his mouth found hers. He jokingly tried to get her to climb in the bath with him, but she refused and instead pulled him out of the bath, giggling, and to the bed. Her hands tangled in his hair and he leaned over her to kiss her again and again and again. He was still wet from the bath and soaked her shift even as he dragged his hands over her breasts and ribs and abdomen, in search of the hem. They had made love a hundred different ways by now, but this was so uniquely a time of reacquaintance. She checked if he still shivered when she licked a path along his collarbone (he did), if she nibbled lightly against his lips his eyes would roll back in pleasure (they did). Tyrion liked a bit of pain with his pleasure and so as she arched in response to his fingers at her entrance, she made sure to scrape her nails across his back.

_(She tries to think of pain as not unlike when he sweeps his hand under her and probes at her arsehole, it’s something that he likes, that is slightly shameful perhaps, a sign of trust even, that the other can provide that pleasure without judgement but she knows in this thing, this pain brightens everything for Tyrion, that he seemingly can’t live without it, not in work, not in love, she tries to deny how powerful it makes her feel to claw at him, she’s a true wolf now.)_

Tyrion trembled. His fingers pushed deeper; his thumb found her nub. Her head tossed back, her hips canted in rhythm and his name slipped through her lips. As soon as she finished, Tyrion pressed against her, she reached for him and he spilled into her hand as he bestowed fevered kisses to the underside of her breast.

When they had spent themselves, they lay side by side, Tyrion splayed his hand across her quivering stomach. 

_(Looking back, she will not know why she chose this moment, this perfect, kind moment to spoil, except that sometimes sex with Tyrion means that she feels looser and like she has an ally.)_

Without preamble, “My mother and brother are alive.” 

Tyrion stopped the ministrations he had been beginning on her breast, “What?” 

“They survived the Red Wedding and have been living in Volantis.” 

Tyrion sat up _(she loves how he keeps his hand at her hip, grounding her, it is such a mindless bit of affection)_ , “How—”

She told him what they had told her. She could see his mind already whirring, “Bran must have—” he broke off, “Your brother’s a real bastard sometimes.”

“He sent me a raven yesterday morning, it said ‘The pack survives.’ I mean it seems obvious now, but I keep looking it over and thinking about it.” 

Tyrion sighed heavily, “Bran likes his games at times. He doesn’t pay attention to everything he has the ability to see and never thought to look for them and so just learned of their survival and was trying to reassure you. He could have kept this to himself from the moment he became the Three-Eyed Raven. He could be trying to advise you; it could mean any number of things.” He kissed her shoulder, “Bran, out of anyone, doesn’t mean you harm. More importantly, how did Varys miss this?” 

“Even Varys has limits.”

“Not many.” 

“He surely knows now; I’ve tried to keep them in isolation but surely the maids must have seen them.” 

“You’re sure it’s them?” Tyrion tugged on his lip and Sansa rose to kiss the corner of his mouth. He ignored her, too lost in thought. 

“Arya examined them.” 

Tyrion stared at the ceiling a long moment, “Why now?” 

“The Kingdoms have stabilized. Essos is in chaos. Three Stark rulers. It’s spring. It is the safest the continent has been for them since before the war.”

“A readymade kingdom, a strong independent North, allied with a stable, friendly South. It’s like a plum ready to be plucked.”   
She hesitated, chewing her lip. Tyrion took her face in his hands, “Sansa, I know that you’re their family but you must have considered the possibility that Robb will want back what he left and the Northerners may trust him more than they trust you.” 

“Of course, I have!” She cringed inwardly at her harshness, “Arya thinks I will move to assassinate them.” 

He looked at her, his eyes filled to the brim with something like pity, something like kinship, “Will you?” 

_(He knows better than anyone the price of a brother’s love and the cost of a sister’s ambition. He rarely talks about his siblings, almost never calls their names when awake. She knows that they are part of why he has never remarried, his intentional destruction of this particularly twisted branch of Lannisters is not just due to his love of her. But he also knows loyalty, loyalty to the point of madness.)_  
  
“It has not come to that yet.” 

Tyrion nodded, “I would like to meet with them in the morning. As an emissary from their kinsman.” 

Sansa considered and then nodded, “No business with them.” 

“I understand.” His fingers tangled in her hair. 

_(She knows that she sups at his feelings for her like she is famished but there is guilt there because if ever she and Bran came to be adversaries, a rare possibility but a possibility nonetheless, that he would be split in two yet again. Maybe he already is.)_

It seemed to satisfy Tyrion. His touches, for the rest of the night, are soft and tender and intended to be soothing. She hated every moment, not wanting to think about it anymore, pushing for roughness, until she finally whispered, “By the Gods, Tyrion, just fuck me.” 

And he did.   
\--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! Tyrion's here!


	5. are they flourished in times that were guarded in wool

Sansa left almost immediately afterward. It was inaccurate, she had found from her own experiences, that an illicit affair meant lounging with a lover long into the night. Their secret meetings were short, often frantic, and it was rare that they felt safe enough to linger, naked, for any innocent maid or little bird to discover.

Unable to return to sleep, she sat up as pink dawn slanted across her room, starting early on her papers, final preparations for her meetings with Tyrion.

She summoned Jeyne to forewarn Arya and the others that she had told Tyrion of their return and he would be coming to dine.

When it was time for to meet with her mother and brother, she delayed. She pretended to herself that was dithering over a gown, not the dread that she now associated with her family.

_(“I think Robb means to be king.”_

_Arya’s eyes had widened and then closed as if Sansa was repeating a nonsense phrase, “Sansa, it’s been two hours since they returned, and you already seek to make them your enemies.”_

_“I do not! How dare you say that Arya—”_

_“Go to bed, Sansa, I will have no part in your plotting.”)_

She never had any help to dress, except on occasion Jeyne. _(She cannot stand a stranger’s hands on her skin, looking, not looking at her body.)_

As she searched through her jewels for her ruby pendant, she found Bran’s note: ‘The pack survives.’ She creased its corners. Arya was right and Bran, too, if he meant what she thought. Robb was not going to steal her kingdom, there was no reason to treat him like a traitor. She was not going to allow Robb to sit on the throne either, but that did not necessarily equate to bloodshed. They were at Winterfell, not Cersei’s court.

_(Petyr chuckled condescendingly in the corner, “Well, sweetling, your sister will be happy. This is less a plot and more a game of unnecessary risk—”_

_She waved him away.)_

\--

Tyrion had watched her go, her braid swinging over her shoulder as she turned to face the day. It was always like this and he tried hard not to resent it.

_(He sometimes wondered how he had ended up here, again, nurturing a secret love and a clandestine lover, a wife that he could never name as such publicly. Tysha, Shae, Sansa._

_His image of Tysha had long been refashioned. He could never quite remember the shape of her eyes, the length of her neck, her voice he had been sure of for a long time until he realized it had fused in his mind with that of a favorite whore in King’s Landing. He remembers one thing, the one thing that worms in his mind: “Hold me, Tyrion, call me beautiful.”_

_Shae’s betrayal still sat bitter on his tongue and for all his guilt, there was still a roiling anger at her, at himself, for being so foolhardy. He can only remember the chill of gold metal chains, wrapped around his white fists and he wants to be sick._

_Sansa, though. Sansa was more lasting, more enduring, more alive and real than Shae could have been and than Tysha ever had the agency to want to be.)_

He had been surprised by her revelation last night and disturbed that it was the first that he had heard of the prodigal Starks. There had been rumors, of course, but there were rumors that his sister’s ghost drowned children in the bay below Casterly Rock.

His memories of Catelyn Stark were still sharp. He had admired her even when she held him in ridiculous captivity and thrown him to the mercy of her mad sister. Robb Stark, however, was an amalgamation in his mind of Lannister myth, Ned Stark, and his brief impression of the boy on his two visits to Winterfell. Talisa, the woman that had cost the Starks their rebellion, he had never met though he supposed she must be lovely.

Sansa had told him that she had kept them confined to East Wing, only allowing them access to her solar to dine. Tyrion was intimately acquainted with her solar—the majority of their deliberations took place there though this morning it had been rearranged so the large table that usually was spread with maps was piled with food. Sansa was not there when he entered though Catelyn Stark and her son and his wife certainly were.

“Ahh, Lady Stark, Lord Robb, it is not every day I have the honor to dine with ghosts,” he smiled winningly though Lady Stark seemed unmoved.

“Lord Tyrion,” she rose to greet him. She was older, her face still striking but now lined, her auburn hair turned almost completely to silver. Robb, too, looked older, more man now than boy.

And next to him—“You must be Lady Talisa.” She _was_ lovely. He had heard that she had been from Volantis but she looked like it too—dark eyes and hair, full lips, and—

“Tyrion, how did you sleep?” It was Arya, blending into the shadows as usual.

He eyed Arya suspiciously, “Well, my lady. It was a long journey.”

Arya hid her grin in her goblet, “I’m sure it was.”

He sat up at the table, helping himself to a rasher of bacon, “So, Lord Stark, you have had a long journey home, we have well and truly thought you dead these many years. I would hear how you,” he looked to Catelyn who had reseated herself and to Talisa, “all of you came to be so…not dead.” He tried a charming smile again, but Lord Robb had apparently inherited his father’s humorlessness.

“We have also had a long journey, ser, we escaped to Volantis where we have been living for a good many years,” Lady Catelyn was still so full of dignity, like Sansa in her mannerisms, “We received little news about Westeros in our absence but heard recently that the Seven Kingdoms were at peace and the Starks occupied Winterfell again. So, we decided it was safe to come home.”

Tyrion chewed on his bacon thoughtfully, “I always did wonder what news of Westeros reached the East. I travelled there myself but I’m afraid I was a little distracted.”

Arya snorted into her cup, earning a sharp maternal look from Catelyn.

“Not much and most of it seemingly untrue. Fantastical stories, really, wights and magical birds. I am afraid we are still quite ignorant of much of the truth of recent events,” Robb replied.

It took a brave man to admit to that, Tyrion thought, especially if he intended what Sansa feared and made a claim for her crown. “You would be surprised, my Lord.”

He was interrupted by Sansa’s arrival, flanked by ever-present Jeyne. Out of habit he rose, “Your Grace.”

“Lord Hand,” Sansa said coolly, extending her hand. He kissed it.

_(Sometimes the dichotomy between public and private is so whiplash confusing. A few hours ago, he had kissed her lips and her cunt and now it was like it had never happened. This is another thing that he tries not to resent, tries not to resent how perfect and unflustered she can seem, how different she is at court than in his bed.)_

She was fully armored as the Ice Maiden today; he could tell by the set of her shoulders. She acknowledged her mother and brother and even tries a smile at her good-sister but she had retracted behind a shield of frost. She sat, gesturing to Jeyne to join them.

He continued, “Your brother, Your Grace, was just telling me that he has heard fairy-tales about Westeros.”

Sansa arched an eyebrow, “Well, I can see how it may seem like that to an outsider.”

Tyrion glanced quickly to Robb and Catelyn who wear mirrored expression of disapproval. He cannot help but feel a surge of pride at his inclusion even if it is at the expense of isolating her family. He can see how Sansa is calculating her remarks, testing to see what strikes and what hurts, she drew back slightly, offering, “It has been a rather unusual time. Wouldn’t you agree, Arya?”

Arya nodded, “Yes.”

No one seemed willing to offer further elaboration, so Tyrion decided to change tactics, “What _have_ you heard about Westeros?”

Robb seemed to think about whether to answer him. It had been awhile since Tyrion had been this mistrusted, “We heard that you, my Lord, brought dragons to defeat your sister after killing your father who accused you of killing your nephew the King. You did all this to sleep with my sister, your wife.”

Robb’s fist clenched about his butter knife and Tyrion got the distinct impression that if the ladies were not present that the utensil would be at his throat. He cast a quick look to Sansa who, to all appearances, was not listening and instead buttered a piece of fried bread serenely. Talisa, he noted, looked nervous and Catelyn had fixed him with a glare. Tyrion nonchalantly plucked a strawberry from the bowl on the table, “Continue.”

“The Targaryen girl summoned the White Walkers to come down from beyond the Wall and reigned terror on the North and the South and finally, once her revenge had been quenched and yours and the others in your company, she was killed by her own dragon. Then you summoned our brother, Bran, from beyond the wall, who had turned into a bird by a red priestess and made him king. You then deposed my half-brother Jon who was the King of the North and exiled him to die beyond the wall at the hands of a giant. Now the bird king rules, and Sansa has enchanted him to remain Queen in the North.”

He looked at Sansa and shrugged, “It’s not that far off.”

Sansa took a bite of her bread, chewed, swallowed, “I’m sure the Lord Hand would be delighted to fill you in on some of the more technical details at some later date but today we must meet to discuss lumber pricing.”

Tyrion nodded, “ _Appropriate_ lumber pricing.”

Sansa fixed him with a smirk, a rare crack in her façade, “And naval trade.”

He groaned, “Sansa!”

“Lord Hand,” she replied, neutral as ever, “I do believe that you forget yourself.”

He had but he persisted, “I do apologize, Your Grace, but we settled the naval trade issue last year—”

“You have no idea what I am offering you, Lord Tyrion.”

_(She loves it when they’re like this. Combatting, discussing, her whole mind is engaged. His face is furious and beautiful, and she loves him the most when he is thinking and plotting even if it is against her. It makes her wonder what her mother thinks of her as she and Robb and Talisa watch this exchange. Can’t you see that I am different, stronger, better than you made me?)_

“If it’s like the past five years then nothing except the terrorization of southern ships and merchants.”

The naval trade had been a sticking point since the inception of the North. Sansa had ensured the building of an impressive navy despite limited ports. However, in order to trade beyond the southern kingdoms, Northern ships needed to pass through Southern ports often to stock and change crew members. Tyrion and Bronn supported taxing Northern ships and Sansa had lost the battle to keep the routes untaxed in the first round of negotiations. She had brought it up relentlessly as a bargaining chip (all the while instructing her captains to avoid tax checkpoints and resort to piracy if necessary) until last year, Tyrion had finally granted her a waiver in exchange for agricultural support. Now here it was again.

“My Lord, I am disappointed by your exaggerations. We will carry on the discussions after petitions,” Sansa finished off her bread with a delicate flourish, “I must excuse myself. I do apologize Mother and Robb, I am still planning the announcement of your…return. I do not think it would be safe for you to go beyond the East Wing again today,” She stood to go, inclining her head slightly, ignoring her mother’s exasperated exclamation, “Jeyne, with me.”

She swept out of the room.

\--

The rest of the meal was quiet. Ignoring Robb’s murderous scowl, Tyrion talked with Talisa (who had a lovely personality to match her lovely figure). Her tale of escaping the Frey slaughter was harrowing indeed, nearly bleeding to death by the side of the road, watching from the woods as her husband’s men were brutalized. It was not exactly the type of conversation that Tyrion had ever had sober—

_(“The one thing I don’t like about you,” Sansa had told him once, when he had appeared at her chamber door, deep in his cups, “is your drinking.”_

_“The one thing?” He grinned at her, ashamed of his sloppiness, ashamed that he could not face what she told him._

_Sansa had not been dissuaded. “Never come to me drunk again.”)_

Robb and Catelyn remained silent. He half-listened to Talisa, it was a truly interesting tale, but he also observed them. He had never taken the Starks for plotters (save Sansa) and that had been so much a part of their downfall. Robb in the North was an unknown quantity. He had never truly ruled, just fought to rule. He had that same charisma that Jon Snow had, that Dany had, for that matter, the ability to persuade men to follow him even when the battle was unwinnable. Robb was still a Stark and the formation of the continent would remain unchanged—three Stark monarchs. They would presumably remain allies because Bran was still down south. But he remembered Robb as being more unbending than Sansa was, potentially more unwilling to be partners.

But would Robb be able, if he so chose, to draw support away from Sansa? Sansa who had freed the North, outwitted his entire family, toppled a dynasty, killed her husband and her adopted father. Sansa who apparently still had issues with their naval agreements. What would a North without Sansa look like? Robb had, in his youth, been a true wolf. Wildly clever on the field, wildly bold, and wildly foolish. So much like Jon. And what about their mother? He swung his head to glance at Catelyn whose choices helped get them where they were today. Who would she support? A mother whose pack was divided, whatever would dutiful, traditional, honorable Catelyn Stark do?

 _(The first time they have sex, it is because she is sad. It is his first diplomatic mission to the North, and it is not going particularly well. Sansa is hard to read, harder to negotiate with. She is_ good. _Her people are enamored of their beautiful, kind, untouchable queen. Northern recovery is going well and so Tyrion has been left with very little leverage. They had taken to the habit of sitting in the library after their tense meetings are done. Like all his habits, an accident of fate. He has been pining for her for weeks, months, maybe years. It is the last week before he is meant to leave. The whole trip was already a mess. He had told her that he loved her, she had kissed him and held his hand, and told him that she would not—could not marry again. When he finds her in the library that night, she is sad._

_“I miss my mother,” she whispers, “Do you think she would have approved of me? My father would hate me. Robb would have hated what I have become.”_

_He has no answer for her, because he truly does not know and he cannot bear to offer her false comfort and then her mouth is on his and his hands are under her skirt—)_

It was all too murky. He excused himself and allowed Arya to show them back to the gilded prison Sansa had fashioned for them.

\--

She cannot get her council to focus on anything but her latest set of marriage proposals.

“I like the Prince of Dorne, wealthy, access to trade routes farther south, he’s young,” Lady Flint perused the letter.

“Is he the one with the ten bastards?” Sansa asked.

“Is there a Dornishman with less than ten bastards?” Lord Manderley chortled.

“What about Lord Arryn?” Jeyne was always so delicate when discussing marriage like she was afraid Sansa would lose her patience. _(Upon further reflection, it might be a strategy based in experience.)_

“No. Absolutely not.” Sansa knocked her knuckles on the table, a warning.

“Your Grace, we will need to make a decision at some point,” Lady Flint said gently.

Sansa pursed her lips and considered all the letters fanned in front of her. She moved them like she was arranging cards, Dornish prince, her cousin Robin, two from the minor remnants of Houses Lannister and Tyrell, three separate Essosi nobles, even one from an Iron Bank representative. _(“The most powerful weapon a woman has is between her legs,” Cersei sneers.)_ “Do we?”

Lord Glover spluttered, “Sorry, Your Grace?”

“Do we have to accept any of them?”

Lord Manderley frowned at her, “Well, I understand that you have had unpleasant marital experiences—”

“Yes, that is one way to put it, Lord Manderley.”

“But, Your Grace, we will need external support eventually and the best alliances can be formed through marriage.”

“Yes, but men will do much to woo a woman, my lord. This month alone we have received a share of crops from Lord Arryn, goods from Dorne, a tentative promise for military support from Essos, what happens if we,” she stared at the ceiling as she searched for the appropriate words, “continued to explore our options.”

Her counsellors stared at her.

“Indefinitely.”

\--

By the time she and Tyrion meet in the afternoon, Sansa was exhausted. Tyrion waddled into her solar, arms full of papers, and crowed, “Well, Your Grace, what is it about naval trade?”

When she looked at him, her eyes were tired, and he was torn between wanting her to rest and knowing that this may be the optimal time to push her on border defense.

She replied, “I think we should start with lumber pricing.”

Her energy returned as they argued:

“Tyrion, that is absolutely absurd! You cannot place troops there—that is not your jurisdiction!”

_(She realized about two years ago, had the revelation in the middle of one of their late night library discussions about Dornish poetry of all things, that Tyrion, not Jeyne, not Arya, not Brienne, not Jon, but Tyrion was her best friend. She told him and she thought it was a sweet, lovely thing to tell him. But his look told her that he knew already and that it made him sad to hear her acknowledge it.)_

They argued back and forth for a time before reaching an impasse. At this point, in past years, they would either go and dine with her household or if their conversation had stretched pass the dinner hour they would stumble into her bedroom—

( _He is sure that her household must know at least a piece of what they do when he comes to visit. It is a testament to Sansa’s ability as a ruler that she has managed to forestall the question of her marriage for so long and that her household tolerates that she sneaks around with a Lannister. That he has not heard whispers of their relationship beyond their close circle of allies is something he also lays at Sansa’s feet. Her people know that she has been hurt, have seen Tyrion enough to know that he won’t. She is discreet but he worries that eventually she will be forced to face the reality of Robyn Arryn’s offers or answer the Dornish prince’s flirtations with more than wit. That would be something he is not sure he could bear; not sure she should bear. It is something they have pushed off since the beginning of this. That this love too will eventually be another tragedy, Sansa—)_

“Jon is set to arrive next fortnight,” Sansa said. She was tidying her desk. This was part of the reason they had moved his visit up two months. Jon, King Beyond the Wall, had wanted to meet to discuss the future of the Night’s Watch.

“How is he?”

_(The last time he had seen Jon, he had wept. Sometimes rebellion strengthened friendship. It had destroyed theirs.)_

“He’s well. He’s taken up with a wildling,” Sansa tried to sound businesslike, but he could tell that she was watching him.

“Of course he has.”

_(Sansa doesn’t like Tyrion’s tone. Jon, of all of them, deserves some comfort. Pot meet kettle, she wants to tell him.)_

She ignored him, “Have you heard from Bran?”

“Not yet.”

“Have you written him?” She sounded like she was talking to an impetuous child.

“I’ve been here for less than a day! Besides, he’s not a king who really needs reports.”

“Still, it’s nice to be thought of.”

_(Oh, does he love her tenderness.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you everybody for the super kind comments! They keep me going!


	6. that you're too good at pulling that wool over me

They dined with her family again. Tyrion had won over Talisa at breakfast and she seemed glad to see him when he entered, escorting Sansa who had changed for the occasion—

_(The gown is an old one but still fine. He seems to have a vague recollection of it. When he sees the peculiar lacing at the back, he remembers. Four years ago, during a rare conference between the Queen and her brother, he had slipped it over her shoulders while she whimpered, “Darling,_ please—" _)_

“I trust your talks went well,” Catelyn said. They all sat, too close for comfort, around a table filled with baked apples, roasted pork, spring greens sprinkled with walnuts, and turnips drizzled with butter. Catelyn was more talkative, unfailingly complementary, she seemed determined to slice through the ice of Sansa’s demeanor.

“We made some progress, yes,” Tyrion agreed, “How were your days?”

“We have become quite well reacquainted with the East Wing.”

Sansa looked at her mother, Tyrion could tell she was considering what to say next. After a pause, “I have thought about that. I will consult with my council tomorrow and an announcement will be made. My brother, Jon, shall be arriving soon and I would like it known before he comes.”

Tyrion noted the stiffening of Catelyn’s spine at the mention of Jon’s name. Interesting.

“We must have discussions about your role in North first,” Sansa paused again.

_(She had a funny way of speaking, breaking off when it seems she’s in the middle of a sentence, waits for the response. It’s a verbal tick he remembers Cersei used to issue threats. Sansa does it all the time._

_“I love you.”_

_He waits for the ‘but’ or ‘however’ but it never comes.)_

Tyrion could not quite believe that she was allowing him to hear this discussion.

The three returned Starks looked at each other. Clearly unexpected. Although, he supposed that everything about this new Sansa is, to them, unexpected.

Robb started carefully, “You have clearly watched over our kingdom with great care.”

Tyrion felt a pressure begin to build up behind his eyes, _Don’t do this, Lord Stark._

“But, Sansa,” he reached his hand out to his sister, a peace offer, _a mistake,_ “I was elected King of the North, I declared us independent. I will strive to learn our new country, but it is my country, too.”

Sansa looked unchanged, neutral, she had been expecting this after all _(“Sometimes, when I try to understand a person’s motives, I play a little game…” Petyr whispers against her ear.)_ “So, you wish to be king?” is what she says aloud.

“You would be on my Small Council, my Hand even.” The way Robb said it made it sound like generosity, a gift, a partnership.

Sansa looked to Arya first then to Tyrion. He tried to communicate something to her, love, support, hardness, but all he received in return is a look that is something not unlike Bran.

“Are you sure?”

She was offering her brother an out, Tyrion understood, a chance to not do this to them. To their house.

Robb looked serious. Looking to Catelyn and then Talisa, “Yes, Sansa. I am.”

Tyrion suppressed a groan.

“Well,” Sansa said, she scooped a helping of turnips to her plate, “there shall have to be a period of transition and, as you say, brother, education,” she takes a bite of her greens, then adds salt from the dish at her elbow, “we shall announce your intention after Jon’s visit,” she takes a measured sip of ale, “for continuity’s sake.”

_(“Oh, sweetling,” Petyr murmurs warmly, hands around her waist, like a lover, like a father, “good. Keep your foes confused. If they are never certain who you are or what you want, they cannot know what you are like to do next.”)_

Robb looked surprised, pleased, “I am glad, Sansa, I have so missed you.”

The smile on Sansa’s face was sweet as spun sugar.

_(She thinks of a snow castle, a body flying through the clouds, and her first kiss.)_

_(He thinks that Robb is so very like his father.)_

_\--_

The dinner continued peacefully enough. The tension in the air eased for Catelyn, Talisa, and Robb. Arya withdrew into herself. Sansa seemed to warm slightly, offering kind words to Talisa on her hair and inquiring after Arya’s ship repairs. Catelyn seemed pleased as well, she said ‘my girls’ multiple times, looking between Sansa and Arya.

They departed, yawning. Arya, as their shepherd, went with them, throwing a look over her shoulder. It left her and Tyrion alone.

Tyrion waited for the maids to come and clear the dining table before he speaks, “I assume you will not tell me what you are planning.”

Sansa face was pinched, “I gave him a choice.”

_(That’s what Dany had said when she had burned the Tarlys. “I gave them a choice.” It was almost charming in its naivete.)_

“No, you didn’t, not really,” Tyrion pushed his mug of ale away.

Sansa sighed heavily, like an old woman, “No, I didn’t.”

_(And that is the difference between Sansa and every monarch he has ever known. She feels enough shame to close her eyes.)_

“Arya suggested that if Robb becomes king, that we would be free to marry.”

Tyrion schooled his features to a grimace, “But he won’t become king.”

Sansa extended her hand and gathered his in hers. She leaned down to kiss his palm, “No.” Not unkind. Not regretful.

\--

They ended up in her chambers, fucking, because what else were they supposed to do?

_(Sex with Sansa can be many things. Sometimes it is pure physical release, two bodies who have gone without sex for a long, long time, rutting against each other and feeling the forms of each other’s bodies. This is easy. She is a very beautiful woman and she seems to, for whatever reason, desire him. Sometimes it is a way to resolve the tension they found at the negotiating table. That is raw and bombastic, fucking in the truest sense of the word. This is fun, a reminder of why he liked sex so much in the first place. Sometimes it is a way that he shows her what he cannot tell her. Sometimes he infuses every kiss with affection, every caress with reverence. This is—he doesn’t know. He feels for her, more intensely than he ever has for anyone, except Jamie. She’s only ever said it once.)_

Arya’s knock was so perfectly timed to Sansa tying a robe about herself that he wondered how long she had been out there.

“Come in, Arya,” Sansa called.

Arya was not pleased, “For the Gods’ sake, Tyrion, put some clothes on.”

“Don’t look then!” Tyrion pulled the sheets up to his chin, exasperated.

Sansa ignored them both and strides to her vanity in the corner beginning to remove the rings and jewels she wore during the day, _(her hair is mussed and he wants to grin lecherously but Arya’s presence is enough to get him to take a sudden, deep interest in the bed canopy)_ “What do you want, Arya?”

“You’re abdicating,” A fact.

Sansa waved her hand airily, “I am training Robb to become king.”

“So he can become king and you his Hand,” Arya said, “You don’t have a Hand. It would make you very powerful.”

“Yes, it would,” Sansa is washing her face with a soft cloth, gazing into her looking glass.

“But you would be free of the confines of queenship.” Arya cast a long look his way.

_(All his friends seem to pity him. Arya and Davos and Brienne and even Bronn mourn the fact that he is chained to an unwinnable woman. He mourns it plenty himself.)_

“As I am sure Tyrion can tell you, being Hand to the King has its own trials and tribulations,” Sansa said, turning to face her sister, “I am doing what you asked. I will not split our House.”

Arya nodded. It seemed to appease her for a moment before she said, “You are an excellent queen, Sansa.”

Tyrion suddenly was an intruder. Sansa’s face filled with light, “Thank you, Arya.”

Arya goes after that and Sansa crawled back to bed. She kissed along his collarbone, caged his hips with legs, and carded her hands through his hair—

_(He wonders what sex with him is like, how she categorizes it. Many times, it feels like she is giving him love, telling him that she loves him. She only ever told him once. Sometimes he wonders if he dreamed that but the sweet-bitter pang he feels when he thinks on it is proof enough. She is not like him, unable to contain his emotions, constantly spilling over with the weight of his heart.)_

She kissed him on the mouth and rolled over to her table, retrieving a book of poetry, “Read to me, darling.”

_(What his friends do not understand is that he loves Sansa and Sansa does not want to be won.)_

Long after Sansa dozed from his words, he lay awake.

\--

He knew he could not stay but he does not quite know where to go either and so he found himself, as usual, in the library, trying to coax the cold hearth to life.

“Do you need help, my lord?”

It was lovely Talisa, a fat tome under her arm. He jumped slightly.

“I thank you, milady, but we are—” He blows one last time on a glowing ember, it sparked into flame, “there!” He looked at her smugly, pleased with himself.

“Do you mind if I join you?”

“Of course, my lady.”

“I know the library is outside the East Wing but —”

Tyrion shrugged, “It’s your last night to terrorize the maidservants with your ghostly visage. Take the opportunity.”

She laughed. And he smiled at her _(There’s something so addictive about making a beautiful woman_ laugh.) “May I ask what you’re reading?”

“It’s a newer work on medicine by Maester Harlow.” She showed it to him.

“A Treatise on the Use of Human Skulls in the Treatment of Nocturnal Teeth Pain,” he raised his eyebrows, “Fascinating, my lady.”

“I was a healer. Before,” She shrugged like it didn’t matter. _(It clearly did.)_

He settled back in his chair, his own book (a history of Dorne in the time of the First Men) achingly heavy on his lap.

“It’s how I met Robb, actually, I nursed on the battlefield.”

_(There’s a flash of annoyance—he just wants a moment to himself, a moment not consumed by Starks and their feelings and his feelings about their feelings—and then annoyance at himself for being annoyed.)_

He tried to be gentle, “I had not heard that. That is a very difficult calling.”

“It’s how we earned money, too, when abroad—” She halted suddenly, “I’m sorry I don’t mean to disturb you, it’s been a long time to not talk to anyone but Robb and Lady Catelyn.”

“It’s quite alright, Gods know I do my share of talking,” he meant it as a jape, but realized she didn’t know him well enough to find it amusing.

“You were married to the queen, weren’t you?” This was a sudden shift. It made him watch her closely.

“In name only. A lifetime ago.” He manages well to sound dismissive, to keep the melancholy out of his voice.

_(They don’t talk about their first marriage much after the Great War ends. It is not a pleasant memory, but it’s not the worst either. Faced with their tasks to stitch together their kingdoms, it seems so insignificant, one of a million things that happened to them, one of a million things they are trying to mend.)_

“She will not be queen for much longer,” Talisa smiled, it looked wistful.

He suddenly wanted out of this conversation, “No, I suppose not and then your poor husband will be trapped with me badgering me all day about quite dull things like lumber and what soldiers should be moved a quarter inch here and a half inch there.”

Talisa smiled, “There are worse fates.”

He hummed in agreement. A pause, “Well, I will leave you, my lord, to your reading.”

He raised his book in an awkward mimic of a toast, “And you to yours, my lady.”

\--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the lovely comments and kudos! <3
> 
> The fact that this chapter got published on time, at all, is a minor miracle. Let's just say, I am not best buddies with everyone on the Microsoft support team ;) 
> 
> Hope you enjoy! :)


	7. you know life isn't always like the end of your novels

The morning hit like a slap in the face. Sansa felt sore. She kept to her routine. Tyrion had left sometime in the night and the bed was cold and rumpled.

She was about to call for Jeyne to help with her lacings when there is a knock at her door.

“Who is it?” She hurriedly wrapped a shawl around herself to conceal her shoulders.

“It’s Mother, Sansa.”

She took a deep breath, “Come in.”

_(Two nights later, in Tyrion’s room, her arms wrapped about his waist, head against his chest, she asks him: “If you could bring your mother back, would you?”_

_He doesn’t answer for a long time. Eventually, “For what? To see my greatness?”_

_He realizes it sounds harsh and he amends, “I cannot even imagine it, I’m not like you, Sansa, I’ve been a kinslayer since the day I was born.”)_

She was suddenly painfully aware that she had not been alone with her mother at all since her return. Catelyn, unlike Robb, was exactly as she remembered: Straight-backed, courteous, and neat even in the mud and dust of the road.

“We have not had much chance to talk in the past three days.”

Sansa knows that expression and that tone of voice. It was the one from childhood when Catelyn was trying to get them to confess a wrongdoing, giving them a chance to repent for their mistakes before things went any farther.

“I am sorry, Mother, it has been difficult to find the time.”

“I am sure,” it sounded forgiving.

Catelyn crossed the room, Sansa immediately pulled her shawl tighter, “You made a very pretty picture yesterday.”

“Thank you.”

Catelyn gestured her to sit at the vanity and it took Sansa a second to do so, torn between practiced obedience at her mother’s words and practiced defiance of another’s orders.

Catelyn moved behind her, Sansa clutched the fringe of the shawl tightly, but Catelyn only reached for the hairbrush and began to comb out Sansa’s hair.

“Arya is very busy as well, I feel like I have barely seen her either, always rushing from this to that,” Catelyn said as she focused on detangling a knot.

Sansa only nodded.

“I suppose that it is a busy time, of course, we had no idea that you would be hosting Lord Lannister as well.” There was a rebuke buried there somewhere.

“Lord Tyrion and his men are easy enough to manage.”

“You trust him,” Catelyn met her eyes in the mirror as she put down the brush and found the hair oil. She dribbled a little onto her palm and began to work it through Sansa’s hair.

“Yes. He was my friend in King’s Landing, he’s different from what his family was.”

_(She could sense he wanted to continue, “I don’t even know what she was like. If she was like my father or Jamie or Cersei. Cersei loved her,” he gave a bitter laugh, “Not necessarily a point in her favor.”_

_“She must have been kind.” She traces a path down his scarred nose. He catches her fingers and presses a kiss to their tips._

_“And why is that?”_

_“Because you are.”_

_She’s said that before and she means it as affection, always, but it makes him feel like she doesn’t know him at all.)_

“He killed his father,” Catelyn dipped her fingers in the bottle for a bit more oil.

“Tywin Lannister ordered your murder.”

“Still. It makes him a kinslayer. Cursed by the gods.” Catelyn began to pull the hair back from Sansa’s face, braiding the front locks together. Sansa did not answer.

“How is Bran? Really?”

“He is different than he was and the same. He is the Three-Eyed Raven now.”

“What does that even mean?”

“He’s a warg and he contains all the history of the world.” Sansa realized quickly how ludicrous she sounded in the scrunch of her mother’s face, she finished lamely, “It is difficult to describe.” She can see the corner of Bran’s note still stuck out from under her perfume bottles.

“I would like to plan a visit as soon as possible. I am anxious to see him. We knew so little about what had gone on here that it seemed safest to come here first.”

Catelyn selected a few pins from the bowl on the vanity. She fastened Sansa’s plait with two and then stuck the remaining in her mouth as she started on the lower part of her hair. They fell silent for a few minutes, Catelyn deep in concentration. Sansa let her mind drift. It felt nice, calming, like the years were receding and she was a child—

“And Rickon?”

Neither she nor Arya had mentioned Rickon though she supposed his absence spoke for itself.

How does she explain Jon’s grief, the image that she has of Rickon, who never grew more than three in her head, running across a battlefield? How does she explain rotting hands punching through slate, skeletal fingers clutching knives, stabbing through cavities of her ancestors? Watching her men pile the withered, desiccated corpses of her grandfather, father, and brother onto pyres to burn, just in case?

She had never learned to lie: “With Father. He’s with Father.”

Catelyn let out a little whistling breath through her nose, “I thought as much. I should like to see his memorial.”

“Of course.”

Catelyn finished pinning her hair, “There, lovely, just lovely.”

Catelyn’s hands moved to her shoulder and Sansa reaches behind her to grasp at her mother’s fingers. Her mother leaned down to kiss her briefly on her temple.

“You and Arya. I just don’t believe it,” she smiled softly, “I have waited so long to see you. I am so sorry we could not be here sooner. Oh, don’t cry, sweetling.”

Catelyn knelt down next to her like she was a child. Sansa swallowed thickly and blinked away her tears. Catelyn pressed her hand to Sansa’s cheek and Sansa leaned into it.

“You survived. Your father would be so proud.”

_(“Does it make any of it better?” Tyrion asks, “To have them back.”_

_“No,” she lays her head back down on his chest, “It makes it so much worse.”)_

\--

Telling her council about Robb’s return is exactly what she thought it would be.

_(She wishes she could ask Petyr—“Did you ever get tired of knowing what people would do? Did learning everything about everyone ever bore you?” She wanted to ask Varys, last she saw him, but she knows that they’re not quite the same creature.)_

All except Jeyne, of course, are stunned when Sansa brought Robb and Catelyn to them.

“We must plan a feast! A celebration!” boomed Lord Manderley, after roundly kissing her mother on the cheek.

Lady Flint was, for once, short of words, “Why, I just don’t believe it! I just don’t believe it!”

Jeyne wept again at such a happy scene.

Lord Glover remained silent.

\--

The next day when they met, Robb announced his intention to the council to assume the throne again. Sansa did not speak. Lord Manderley looked pleased, like it was obvious. Lady Flint was questioning. Jeyne was quiet but wished him well. Lord Glover was stiff.

After the meeting, Lady Flint cornered her, “Your Grace, are you truly going to leave the throne to your brother?”

Sansa smiled, “I am training him, Lady Flint. No announcements will be made until my brother, King Jon, has arrived.”

Lady Flint pursed her lips and looked about to ask another question when Sansa was called away.

\--

That afternoon, she invited Robb into her solar. She unfurled maps of Westeros and in her best impression of Maester Luwin began to explain the past eight years. As with her mother, it had not escaped her notice that this was the first time they had been alone since she was a child.

“After you—” she hesitated, “left, Winterfell went to the Boltons. In King’s Landing, Joffrey married Margaery Tyrell but was murdered at the wedding.”

_(She does not tell him: that while Robb and Talisa wed under a heart tree, she looked at their father’s rotting head, leathering in the sun, that she had the chance to escape with Hound, that he had wanted to kiss her as well, but that he frightened her too—)_

Robb let out a sardonic laugh and she smiled briefly.

“As you know, Lord Tyrion and I were married at the time—”

It was then that Robb interrupted, his hand covered hers.

_(It was an eerily familiar gesture and she realized she did all the time when she wanted to comfort someone.)_

“Did he hurt you?”

She squeezed the tips of his fingers, “No, Tyrion was always very kind. I would not allow him here if he were not.”

Robb nodded vigorously, in relief.

“Now it was Petyr Baelish—”

_(Petyr appears unexpectedly at her shoulder, summoned by the mere mention of his name.)_

“Mother’s friend.”

She rolled her shoulders, “Yes, Grandfather Tully’s old ward. He arranged Joffrey’s murder with Olenna, Margaery’s grandmother—”

“What?”

Robb was a good audience, gasping at the right points (“Wights are real?”) and asking the right questions (“If Bran’s the Three-Eyed Raven, is he watching us right now?”) but Sansa resisted the urge to theatricalize what had happened as she knew Tyrion or Jon or even Arya could do when reminiscing.

_(What she does not tell him: Baelish always smelled and tasted of mint, he liked to kiss her more times than that once in the snow, that she remembers feeling pleasure at watching Lysa’s body soar through the Moon Door.)_

She told him: “Baelish assumed my marriage to Tyrion annulled and married me to Ramsay Bolton—”

Robb tensed and shifted in his chair, “I heard rumors about Ramsay, how he—”

“Was not kind,” she skated over it, “But Theon, who had been held in captivity there, and I left and made it to Castle Black where I reunited with Jon. We then went back to Winterfell, allied with Baelish’s forces—"

_(She does not tell him: the wash of relief at seeing Jon, she suspects that he knows that feeling anyway, Jon’s tenderness and Brienne’s loyalty propping her up, feeling so heady seeing Baelish grovel on his knees, like she wanted every person who had ever wronged her to do that—)_

“You allied with him?”

“Yes.”

_(She remembers the smirk on Baelish’s face when she appeared at his camp the morning of the Battle, the table in his tent already laid for two places, his swagger as he called his banners--)_

“Sansa, he married you off to your family’s enemy.”

“That was my choice.”

Robb stared at her.

“He gave me a choice, him or Winterfell, and I chose to go home,” she said. Matter of fact.

“Sansa—”

“We all make choices, Robb, I do not regret mine.” _(Petyr eyed her skeptically and she ignored him.)_

She continued, “We won the battle and retook Winterfell. Rickon and Ramsay were killed in battle.”

Robb nodded approvingly.

_(She can still hear Jon pounding the life out of him, and later, after she had a servant drag him to kennels, the tearing of viscera, the shrieks of the hounds, Ramsay’s cries until his throat was ripped out, the slop the next morning, the shouts of discovery, Jon explaining it away, “He must have gained control of the guards,” how he had willfully ignored the shredded restraints, the broken stool, how he had given her access to his cell, kissed her forehead instead. How when she told Arya what she had done, her sister had merely nodded in understanding.)_

“Jon was elected king. In the south, a religious revival had taken hold of King’s Landing and gained partial control of the city. Cersei blew up the Sept of Baelor, killing the Queen Margaery, Tommen died of grief—”

_(Jon had told her of Tyrion’s reaction when he realized what had happened to his nephew._

_“I’ve never heard anything like it, Sansa,” Jon had said, “Like he was being flayed.”)_

“—and Cersei became Queen in the South. At the same time, Daenerys Targaryen had gathered support in Essos and landed at Dragonstone.”

“We heard about her rule in Mereen.”

An unspoken understanding passed between them and, in that moment, she wondered if maybe he would approve of her actions after all.

“Jon decided it was prudent to go and visit her at Dragonstone to gather support for the coming army of wights. It meant, however, bending the knee to Daenerys—”

Robb groaned and she smiled at him, “It was not my choice.”

“I should hope not!” he exclaimed.

They laughed briefly and it felt good.

She hesitated, “He also fell in love with her.”

Robb stopped then, “Oh.”

“Yes.”

There was a brief silence.

“They decided to try to convince Cersei to come to their aid to save the continent from the Night King, they even brought her a wight they captured to show her. But she would not—”

_(She was not there for this part, holed up and at odds with Arya in Winterfell, trying to make sense of the account books and placating lords. Letting Arya trace her still-fresh scars to convince her that Petyr was trying to divide them. While Jon and Tyrion and Daenerys faced Cersei, she lay awake in Arya’s bed, plotting to kill Petyr.)_

“—and so they decided to attack King’s Landing that very night.”

_(Jon and Tyrion’s accounts of this are different._

_Tyrion’s: Jamie left in the middle of the night and arrived, sweating and angry in Tyrion’s tent to join their cause, telling him the truth of Tommen and Myrcella and the Sept. After they secured pardon for Jaime, it was then that Tyrion had decided that now was time to attack. Jon agreed. He convinced Daenerys to not use dragon fire, Varys still had enough connections to convince some of his little birds to open the gates, and their meagre forces streamed in silently, taking the Red Keep quietly, by surprise, and it was Tyrion himself who woke Cersei in her bed, covering his hand over her sleeping mouth, who ordered her to be put under house arrest for her trial._

_Jon’s: Tyrion had raged late into the night, cursing his sister and his brother and father, that he begged Daenerys to destroy them. Jaime arrived as night fell and the two brothers plotted to go through the gate in the bay below the Keep, that as Jon and his soldiers destroyed the guards, pushed the Mountain to his death, garroted Cersei’s evil maester, it was the Lannister brothers together who went to Cersei’s room. It was Jaime who discovered Euron Greyjoy in her bed and in a jealous rage dragged her from her bed by the remaining tufts of her hair and carried her, screaming, to Daenerys’ new throne room and thrust her before her new queen._

_What is certain and what she tells Robb is: The Red Keep was taken, the residents of King’s Landing awoke to the flapping of Drogon’s wings, Cersei’s attendants were all killed in secret battle and Cersei herself brought before Daenerys for justice.)_

“But she was pregnant.”

“With her brother’s child?” Robb looked vaguely ill.

“Perhaps. She was kept there, under strict arrest, pleading her belly. And they took the rest of her forces and headed North.”

They were both growing tired, she could see, and so she placed her hand over Robb’s and said gently, “We can continue again at another time.”

Robb stood to leave, saying something about finding Talisa and Mother, she nodded. Before he left he embraced her, whispering into her hair, “Sansa, you have been so brave.”

She blinked away tears and wrapped her arms about his waist, like she remembered doing with Father when she was frightened.

He grinned at her and she beamed.

\--

_(That night, in the library, playing cyvasse with Tyrion, he will ask her how her lesson with Robb went and she will respond, “He would make a good king.”_

_“If?” Tyrion will say it delicately._

_“If.” She is going to agree.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thus begins my TEDTalk for how S8 could have worked...They should attacked King's Landing first, jailed Cersei, and then made for the North.
> 
> I am still blown away by everyone's kudos and the wonderful comment discussions! <3 I appreciate you!


	8. and the band started up and the lady is risen

It took two days to gather all the courtiers and important notaries together. The minor lords, servants, merchants all crushed together in the Great Hall, craning their necks to get sight of their queen. Tyrion had no place of honor here, never had, never would. 

_(Sansa had insisted, in first year that he came to negotiate, that there be no feast in his honor. “We’re Northerners, Lord Tyrion, we don’t share your Southern indulgences.”)_

So he stood, wedged between Lord Tallhart (who had surely earned his name) and a merchant visiting from White Harbor, waiting for Sansa’s appearance. 

Sansa had dressed that morning in grey wool, a threaded white direwolf bounding across her skirt, hair twisted into thick Northern braids. She glided down the length of the hall, greeting as she went, offering the occasional hand to someone she recognized, before ascending the dais to her throne. 

_(The throne was a modest thing. A glorified dining chair if he was being honest. For Bran, he had commissioned Gendry Baratheon, the Forger of the Stormlands, as he was now known, to create a masterpiece. Clawed dire-wolf feet, a splayed back of metal raven’s feathers, arms pounded with the symbols of all the kingdoms and major houses. He had heard rumors that Sansa rejected every proposal for her own throne’s design until choosing a well-known woodcarver in winter town who offered this one ready-made as a gift.)_

“My people,” she began, “I come before you today, the bearer of glad news. Eight years ago, it was supposed that my brother, the Lord Robb Stark, his wife Talisa Stark, and my lady mother, Lady Catelyn Stark, were killed at the hands of the Freys in a deplorable act of betrayal and treason. Five nights ago, they all three appeared, alive and well, at our doorstep, ready to be welcomed to their ancestral home, a free and independent North! I bid you to welcome before you, the House Stark, reunited!” 

Robb dressed in an old jerkin and cloak of Eddard’s with Talisa and Catelyn in borrowed gowns were ushered into the hall. 

There was a silence. Then a collective gasp. Then havoc.

\--

The commotion raged on for quite some time. Greetings, curses, disbelief, joy. Sansa could see from her place the whole gambit of reactions. She found Arya, standing in the very back gallery, watching as their brother was hoisted into the air.

Their mother was being embraced by one of her old lady’s maids. Talisa was caught under Robb’s arm. 

Tyrion was in the middle of it, avoiding being jostled. He flicked his gaze to hers as if to say: What now, darling?

\--

By nightfall, once the majority of the non-resident courtiers had left, fluttering, Lord Manderley’s calls for feasting were finally answered, and kegs of ale and beer and wine were pulled from cellars and hocks of ham cut from the kitchen’s rafters. 

Robb sat at the center of it all, wrapped around Talisa, greeting old friends, and laughing and drinking. Even Catelyn, a stickler for etiquette, had drifted down to the masses, to search for a familiar face. Sansa remained on the dais.

Tyrion sidled up to her, “A dragon for your thoughts, Your Grace?” 

“I am thinking that I will need to place another order for spirits from Highgarden this moonturn.” 

Tyrion chuckled, “I am sure that Lord Bronn would only be too happy to accommodate you.”

Sansa smiled wryly but stayed focused on the crowd. 

Tyrion continued, “They seem pleased that the Young Wolf lives.”

“Give them a few days,” she turned her head subtly, pointedly to Lord Glover who was slouched over his trencher just below them, speaking lowly to a Hornwood, to Lady Flint and her husband seated apart from the rest, to Lord Tallhart who sat across from Robb, glare hard, “Sooner or later, the North remembers.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you everybody for the lovely comments! :) Hope you enjoy!


	9. and i'll watch you with eyes that can see, i can see

Tyrion left early and nobody missed him.

Sansa tried to follow but got caught in a conversation with the lord steward about appropriate housing for the royal family.

Tyrion wandered for a bit before settling into the library again. Sansa would know to find him there.

He had just begun the second volume of Dornish history when the library door opened. He craned his neck about the wing of the armchair.

It was Talisa again.

“Hello,” he greeted.

She was startled, “Oh, Lord Tyrion!”

“Finished your book already, my lady?”

“Not quite,” she made her way to the fire, sitting opposite of him, “I have found that I have become quite averse to feasts.”

Tyrion cleared his throat, “Well, that is certainly understandable.” He cleared his throat again, “Given the circumstances.”

“And you, my lord?”

_(What he doesn’t say: Usually, your goodsister, the Queen, and I, use feasts as an excuse to sneak off for a quick fuck.)_

He said: “I’m too old for drinking and carousing anymore.”

_(What he doesn’t add: Besides, the Queen doesn’t like my drinking and feasts are interminably boring without it.)_

He added: “The Dornish are excitement enough for me.”

There was an awkward pause, “My husband does not like you very much.”

He bobbed his head in surprise agreement. _(Well, she’s certainly honest. This is the second time that he has spoken with her and felt like the conversation would be better suited with a cup of something.)_

“My father ordered your murders, so I imagine not.”

“You didn’t, though.”

_(What is she getting at?)_

“No, I most assuredly did not,” he was tired of this accusation. It had taken years to gain if not the trust, if not the respect, then the tolerance of the Northern lords and convince them, if not entirely, if not assuredly, then adequately of his innocence in the Red Wedding.

“Sansa,” the name sounded uncomfortable on her tongue, “would not trust you if you had.”

“No. Though whether the queen trusts me at all is another question. I am here to hammer out trade deals, not affection. You would do well to remember that if you are to be queen.”

_(A warning.)_

“The queen does not seem to trust many people,” Talisa continued, uncowed.

“Queens don’t, generally speaking.”

Blessedly, the library door creaked open then. It was Arya. She raised a single eyebrow at Tyrion, he shrugged and pretended to return to his book.

“Robb is looking for you, Talisa,” Arya said.

“Oh yes, well, thank you, Lord Tyrion. Where is he?”

“Heading to bed, I believe,” Arya replied in as friendly a way as Arya knew how.

“Oh yes, thank you again, good night!” She left.

Tyrion didn’t look up from his page, “And for how long were you out there?”

Arya said, “Not long. Sansa wanted me to see if you were up here.”

“Well, here I am. Is she in her chambers or mine?” He searched for the leather scrap he used to mark his page.

“What did Talisa want?” _(Dogs with a bone, these sisters.)_

“Didn’t you hear the whole conversation?”

Arya didn’t respond. Tyrion finally acquiesced, “I don’t she wanted anything, I think she just needs a friend.”

Arya’s expression was so like her sister, Tyrion almost wanted to laugh. Her tone, however, smooth and steeled, was uniquely Arya, “Be careful, Lord Tyrion, you have a terrible habit of being stupid around vulnerable women.”

\--

Arya left him in his room and less than half an hour later, Sansa knocked on his door. They played cyvasse on his battered travelling set. By the time, they finish their second game, the sky is purpling with light and Sansa must go.

_(He knows she does not sleep well. He doesn’t either. But there’s something in the way Sansa avoids it, always available for another game, always ready to talk no matter the time, that makes him worry. What if she did step down? Maybe she would be able to sleep then without having to think about this proposal or that law._

_No, he decided, in this instance, her crown would not change a thing.)_

\--

Tyrion watched. He watched Robb in the training yard where he befriended some of the younger men, showing them techniques, and sharing japes with the arms master. He watched Robb learn all the castle children’s names and remember those of servants who had worked for his father. He watched as Robb helped a merchant whose cart tipped over in the castle keep. The thing about Prince Robb, as the servants now hesitantly referred to him, was that he was good at kingship. Sansa had him sit in on council meetings and on most of her negotiations with Tyrion. He had learned to listen, and his judgement was sound. He also had natural ability to make friends. He could talk to almost anyone as if they had known each other all their lives. Sansa was beloved but she lived in her people’s hearts like a myth. The Ice Maiden of Winterfell, sister of the Three-Eyed Raven and the Bringer of the Dawn. Robb was just Robb. Tyrion hated to admit it, but he made a compelling contrast to the bird king of the south and the reincarnated Queenslayer beyond the wall.

Tyrion wrote to Bran and the small council, asking for further instruction, which of the king’s siblings to back if it came to conflict.

The small council was brief in their response: ‘Let the wolves fight it out.’

Bran sent a separate reply: ‘The lone wolf dies. You know what to do.’

\--

_(One morning, Tyrion and Sansa breakfasts with her family and Sansa says: “I have taken the liberty of writing to Uncle Edmure about your return.”_

_Catelyn drops her knife, “Edmure lives! We heard—well, no, I mean, we assumed—”_

_Sansa forgets all that they don’t know. It feels exhausting. There’s no time for this._

_“Yes, he is still lord of Riverlands,” Tyrion says, “The Blackfish, though, died many years ago.”_

_He doesn’t mention how._

_“How is he?”_

_“He has several children now, four boys, two girls. The eldest is nearing eight now, I should think,” Sansa says._

_Catelyn is quick, “Eight?”_

_“Yes, they call him Ted,” Tyrion says, reaches for his tea._

_“He stayed married to that Frey girl?” Catelyn is deadly, Robb is disgusted, and Sansa’s knuckles go white around her knife.)_

\--

Sansa watched. She watched as Robb befriended Lord Manderley. She watched him reintegrate himself with her young warriors. She watched him take walks with Talisa in the godswood. He had a talent for leadership, more than she expected. But she could not help but observe the little gaps. He ignored Lord Glover’s displeasure. He allowed Lord Manderley to talk over Lady Flint in meetings. He had not made restitution with the Hornwoods. Watched how Talisa seemed to stay separate from the other ladies of the court, be prone to loneliness, shy away from gatherings.

Robb could also skip the smaller details, the finer points. Small mistakes, forgivable even, in a new ruler.

So, she smiled gently and corrected him quietly that Winterfell would need one hundred and sixteen bushels of wheat, not one hundred and sixty, from Lord Tallhart this year. If she waited until after Lord Tallhart had left the council chamber, huffing, then that was just to spare her brother the humiliation of being corrected by his younger sister. If she had to send an apologetic, corrective letter a few days later from her own stationery and signed ‘Queen Sansa’, why it was such a meagre task, it was not worth bothering anybody over.

\--

It took Lord Glover a week to approach her about Robb. He came to her solar, unannounced, as she was engaged in her latest battle with Tyrion over sea trade.

Tyrion had been shouting, “You cannot do this! Absolutely not! I will not stand to have you avoid paying import taxes, no, Sansa!”

“Tyrion, you are making it impossible for Northern ships to trade. You have essentially made up the revenue from the docking tax by increasing the import tax into a monstrosity.” _(That was actually_ exactly _what he and Bronn had done though he had rather hoped that the gradual increase in fees would be slow enough that she would not notice.)_

Sansa feigned a regretful sigh, “I will be forced to pull back on lumber, which we essentially gift to you with the prices you pay—"

Sansa could tell Tyrion was about to unleash a litany of defenses when Lord Glover knocked.

She smiled triumphantly and called sweetly, “Come in!”

Tyrion harrumphed, leaning back rather forcefully against his chair.

Lord Glover opened the door and peered around, “I hope I am not interrupting, Your Grace, my Lord.”

Tyrion glowered, she replied, “No, we were just finishing.”

Tyrion pulled himself from his chair and collected his papers, “We will finish on the morrow, Your Grace.”

“Of course, my lord.”

Once they were alone, it took Lord Glover no time at all to say, “Are you really going to support Prince Robb in becoming King?”

Sansa bit her lip, “I’m not sure what other choice there is, my lord. He is my father’s heir, the oldest Stark.”

Lord Glover spilled over, “He left! First, he led us into the heart of the Boltons, led my brother to slaughter. At least we thought he had died, too. But to leave! To escape and then return when so many others died! He left us to fight the dead alone, he left us to free the North alone.”

 _(Sansa thought it untactful to point out Lord Glover’s own unwillingness to fight for the North or the living. Petyr shrugged behind her, “At least he’s found his courage_ now. _”_ _She tried to shake him away.)_

Sansa considered him, “I understand your concerns, Lord Glover,” she paused, “I cannot say that I do not also share them.”

“He is a craven.”

“He is also my brother,” she said regretfully, warningly. _(At least that part she did not have to pretend.)_

“I understand, Your Grace, and I understand your joy at his return and your reluctance to see him misplaced.”

Sansa fiddled with her rings, “Well, what do you propose we do, Lord Glover? Robb is king by rights.” _(Like leading a horse to a trough.)_

Lord Glover pondered that for a long while and just as Sansa feared he wouldn’t get it, he said, “No, he isn’t.”

“He’s not?” Sansa asked innocently, “But he’s my father’s oldest son—”

“In the North, that is not a precursor for sovereignty.” _(There we go.)_

“Yes? And?” _(The flutter of an eyelash, she marvels that this is still all it takes.)_

“Your Grace, the houses must approve of a candidate for kingship. Like the elections in the South.”

“It’s usually a formality, Lord Glover.”

“Usually,” she waited for him to get reach his own climax, “unless you opposed him.”

_(“Finally,” Petyr groaned in the corner.)_

Sansa waited, chewed her lip thoughtfully, before saying carefully, “My lord, what you are suggesting would be a betrayal of my family.”

“He betrayed us first.” Glover jutted his chin forward resolutely.

“Let me think on it,” she got up to leave, “And Lord Glover, do not breathe a word of this to anyone, I would not want anyone to think I am plotting against my brother. If we are to do it, it will only work if Robb thinks that an election is his own idea.”

Never a great appreciator of irony, Lord Glover bowed, “Of course, Your Grace.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, as usual, for the wonderful discussions in the comments! I love talking with you all and hearing your feedback! :) <3
> 
> I have taken a few liberties with the Northern system of choosing monarchs and based it on what we think the Iron Age Celtic system was like which somewhat relied on a traditional inheritance model but also had an electoral component to it. :)


	10. she was given her earth by a sea come to rest

_(The first time he speaks to her again, after riding triumphantly into Winterfell, is on the covered bridge overlooking Winterfell’s yard. She was beautiful. More than beautiful. Ethereal._

_He reminisces with melancholy about Joffrey’s wedding and she answers, “It had its moments.”_

_He snorts and his heart nearly bursts with joy._

_“Dragons,” she says, looking to the sky as if one might wing by, “They are fascinating creatures.”_

_“I was obsessed with them as a boy,” he says, like a confession._

_“You were obsessed with them as a man, too, you had all those books about them in our chambers when we were married.”_

_The past tense is wounding, “I didn’t know you paid much attention to what I read.”_

_Sansa does not bother to acknowledge that, and he is grateful._

_“Dragons,” she says again, “They could destroy a whole city if commanded.”_

_He nods._

_She sounds old and prophetic like a witch from a song when she says: “Imagine what Joffrey or Cersei could have done with that kind of power.”_

_She departs then, leaving him alone.)_

_\--_

Sansa spent the next three days avoiding Lord Glover. She also spent the next three days ensuring that Robb was inundated with all of the papers she usually left for Jeyne and Lord Manderley to parse through—border patrol reports, tax collection information, correspondence with minor houses, merchant’s requests. Reams of parchment passed through her solar to his chambers. Jeyne was so busy organizing the household to accommodate all the visitors and Lord Manderley was working so terribly hard on a proposal for the Free Folk, it only seemed fair to share the burden. If some of the information was out of date, well, it was not like she had the time to edit what he received.

She dined with Robb and Talisa and her mother. They spoke mostly of happy, safe memories: Catelyn as a girl, Sansa’s first tooth, Robb’s first fight. Talisa explained Volantis’ customs and her own childhood. The dead hovered at the edge of their conversations, they skirted them like puddles. She did not have time to have another lesson with Robb though sometimes she suspected that he had heard something from a servant or in the training yard, the way he sometimes phrased something in an oddly knowing way.

With the preparations of Jon’s arrival, she does not see Tyrion much during the day. After evenfall, when the rest of the household retired, they played cyvasse, he read to her while she sewed, they made love. They left each other before the first maid arrived to light the braziers.

She could not find Arya, day or night, except when she did not seek her, then Arya appeared at her window and sat and watched her work. Sansa did not ask where she went, about her inordinately long hours in the training yard, why she no longer frequented meals, why, after released from her duties as guide to the East Wing, Arya no longer spoke to their mother or brother unless necessary. Sansa steered away from those questions like whirlpools.

\--

_(The sounds of feasting bubbles below. He had offended Ser Brienne. Jaime had gone after her. And now he was stumbling somewhere in Winterfell, trying to find his chamber._

_“Lord Tyrion?” Sansa appears from an alcove. She is holding her own flagon of wine. The torch light made her hair glow_ _an unnatural crimson and dappled her skin in gold._

_He sways slightly on his feet, “You shouldn’t drink alone.”_

_Her eyebrows arch, “I wasn’t intending to.”_

_So, they sat in the little alcove, cloaks and jackets spread like a blanket at a picnic beneath them, passing back and forth the cup. Here is what they do not talk about: his family, Shae, her family, last night. Here is what they do talk about:_

_“Sheep shifting!” Tyrion guffaws and Sansa smiles prettily, shyly, and he just wants to_ kiss _her._

_Her face is suddenly serious, “Did you mean what you said last night?”_

_“About what?” He knows exactly what she means._

_“About us staying married.”_

_He feels all the drink and mirth drain out of him. She is looking at him like—well, he’s not certain like what because he’s never been looked at quite like this before._

_He doesn’t answer and stares deep into the cup instead._

_“I won’t marry again, Tyrion.” It is kind the way she says it._

_He grasps her hand, “And if my loyalties were not a problem?”_

_She touches the side of his face gently, “Still no.”)_

\--

Robb bit into his apple, “Why don’t we just arrange a marriage alliance with Dorne? They have more autonomy than the other kingdoms, surely then we would have more leverage to lower the import taxes.”

Lord Manderley agreed, “A prominent alliance with Dorne would also help us financially. Their coffers were barely affected by the Great War.”

_Not quite true_ , Sansa thought, as she watched as the two volleyed back and forth ideas. Lady Flint periodically commented, and Lord Glover remained silent except for the occasional, unsubtly long look in her direction.

“We cannot offer just a noble daughter,” Robb said, frowning, “It would have to be someone prominent.”

“The Princess Arya?” Lady Flint offered.

Robb laughed, “They might like that down in Dorne, wild little Arya. I was thinking—Sansa?”

Sansa raised her eyebrows, “And what were you thinking about me?”

“Dorne, they’ve already extended an offer for your hand. I think, of all your offers, that’s the one we should take.”

Sansa instantly felt all eyes on her, “I do not plan on marrying again, Robb.”

Robb placed his hands atop hers. It burned, “Sansa, I know it’s difficult,” his eyes looked so much like Ned’s, “But you will have to. It is your duty.”

\--

_(He doesn’t see her after the feast ends with them parting for separate chambers. Until he happens to wander to the top of the castle ramparts.)_

_\--_

As soon as the meeting was over, she took her leave. She tore down the hall to Tyrion’s chamber when she did not find him there, she went to the library. There he was. Speaking with Talisa.

_(Something within her flares. Arya had told her about finding Tyrion and Talisa speaking in the library. She hadn’t cared. Not really. But now—)_

“Lord Tyrion?” _(Petyr had trained her voice to always be honeyed even when spitting poison.)_

Talisa smiled sweetly at her. Tyrion looked up from his conversation, “Your Grace?”

“You’re needed urgently.”

His eyes grew wide, panicked, “What is it?”

“I’ll explain it all in my solar.”

“Excuse me,” he said distractedly to Talisa and followed her out.

She rushed him down the hall and into her solar and then through her solar door into her bed chamber.

She knelt.

“Sansa, what is the matter—”

She kissed him. And kissed him. And kissed him. And kissed him. Her hands curled in his hair before they migrated down to push off his jacket. He stopped her hands and pulled away.

He searched her face before saying, “Not that I’m complaining, but what are you doing?”

Sansa ignored him and kissed him again instead. This time his hands found their way to her shoulders, one stroking down her neck to the neckline of her gown. He broke away and she became very worried that he would start talking again but he simply moved to press kisses under jaw. She pulled him closer and slung her arm around his back. She felt his breath, hot, in her ear as he whispered, “You really do have a _long_ neck.”

She pulled back to see his face, smiling. His pupils were already blown wide, he ran a thumb along her cheek. His hands were so warm.

_(Their first time:_

_“What is happening?” Sansa is writhing above him, Tyrion’s face buried between her thighs, “Gods, Tyrion—”_

_“It’s alright, Sansa, let go, darling, I have you.”)_

“Robb wants me to marry.”

_(Like most things she tells him, she’s not sure why she always, always, always chooses these kind, sweet moments to ruin.)_

“I see,” he said quietly.

Her whole body suddenly felt very heavy and she dropped her head to his shoulder. She wanted to cry, began to heave like she should be sobbing, but no tears came. He stroked up and down her hair. It took her a moment, she regained her breath and then lifted her head and kissed him again, her hands framing his face.

It went quickly after that. She pulled off his jacket and then began to tug his shirt from his trousers, lifting it over his head. They stopped for breath; their foreheads pressed together. Tyrion’s eyes were closed, and she stroked a finger along the creases in his face.

“Turn around, Sansa,” he said.

She did, kneeling with her back to him, sweeping her hair over one shoulder. He undid her laces inchmeal, pulling them out one by one. It forced her to slow down even as his hands tracing her spine and ends of her scars made her shiver. She felt his breath on her neck, and she pressed her palms to the cold floor to steady herself. She hyperaware of everything: the chill on her back, her nipples chafing against her gown, the silky slide of each lacing, the brush of her hair against her face. When he was done, his hands went to her shoulders. They felt _hot_ compared to the air of the room and she shuddered. He took a step forward and his torso pressed lightly against her naked back. He moved aside her gown and his hands curved around her waist, one thumb reaching up to graze the edge of her nipple, “Gods, Tyrion.”

He kissed the nape of her neck and rested his chin against her shoulder, his voice a growl, “Relax, love.”

“Tyrion, I—”

“I know. Relax.”

She took a deep shuddering breath. She turned her head and caught his mouth again. Her gown had fallen to her elbows and she hurriedly stood to shimmy it off her arms and down her hips and to kick off her slippers. She was about to roll down her stockings and small clothes, but he stopped her with a hand, “Sit.”

She sat on the edge of the bed and he stood between her legs, forcing them to encase his torso. He pinched the edge of her right stocking where it rested in the middle of her thigh and drew it down off the tip of her foot, his hands running the length of her leg. She whimpered lightly and leaned back to rest on her elbows. He glanced up. His eyes were aflame. Not breaking her gaze, he lifted her leg over his shoulder. He repeated the action on her left leg, tossing the stocking behind him. He lifted the other leg and then bent to press a kiss to the arch of her ribs, just below the valley between her breasts. She sighed and raised a hand to touch the top of his curls.

Slowly, he dragged his head down to between her thighs and buried his face there. He inhaled. She moaned. His tongue flicked out. She could feel it _through_ her smallclothes. She cried out.

He tasted her a few more times and she tossed her head back. Then she felt the faint prick of teeth as he bit the seam and pulled.

She was transfixed, staring at the image, her smallclothes between Tyrion’s teeth, only vaguely aware of him dropping her legs off his shoulders, leaving them wantonly splayed. Once they were down to her ankles, he pulled them off with his hands and they joined the stockings on the floor.

She was breathing heavily now and as he returned her trembling legs to prop on his shoulders, she felt her stomach clench in anticipation. He ran his fingers on the edge of her folds.

“What do you want, Sansa?”

_(There’s no other thing in the whole world that feels quite like whenever he asks her this—it’s an energy that jets through her body. She flexes her toes, drops her head back, at its force.)_

“Mouth.” It came out like a gasp.

He obliged with a smirk and moved closer, forcing her legs to fold back toward her upper body. He licked a stripe up her entrance, sending a jolt up her body. She keened. One hand buried in his hair and the other twisted the sheets above her head. He worked and worked and worked at her, tasting, dipping into her. She felt it starting in her toes, pure heat rippled through her, just as it was starting to climb her legs and through her core, he pulled back.

“Tyrion,” she whined even as she unfolded, lowering her legs to cross behind his back, curling up, and brought him closer to taste herself, open-mouthed.

“Let me up,” he said into her mouth.

She moved toward the center of the bed and he shuck his trousers before climbing abed with her. He lay down and then guided her atop of him. She rode him, his right hand at her nub, while his left tangled with hers. This time when she felt the tremors begin in her toes, she let it happen, cresting with a cut-off cry. She bent over, arms haloing his head, her breasts against his neck, her hair blanketing them as she kissed him again.

He came a few minutes later, with a low snarl, pulling out in time to spill over his own stomach.

She relaxed then moving her legs until she lay along his side. They were silent for a while, his seed cooling on his belly. She curled a bit of his hair around her finger, he absentmindedly stroked her thigh.

_(The problem with secrets, Tyrion thought, is that you never talk about them. This affair is a secret. A badly kept one, to be sure, but a secret, nonetheless. If they were married, in the open, he thinks that he could tell her what it feels like to be kissed in the middle of the afternoon.)_

Tyrion turned his head to face her, but she was focused on plucking one of her long strands of hair from his shoulder. “We could ask to renew our marriage.”

_(Even though the words fall out of him almost without intention, it still feels like the bravest thing he has ever done.)_

Sansa smiled but the crease between her eyebrows was still troubled, “And what good would that do? You already are loyal to my brother. Friends don’t need marriage alliances.”

She was right, of course. She started tracing patterns on his upper arm. She spoke again, “If he becomes king, it will not be my choice.”

“We could run away.” _(An old jape, one he’s been told before and one he’s told her before. They’re too old to find it the least bit funny.)_

“Like a song,” She was trying to play along but it was so half-hearted, it just made his throat thicken.

He murmured in response, “Just like that.”

“To where? Braavos?”

“Sure! I quite liked the food in Pentos though.”

She bites her lip and Tyrion’s chest constricted.

“You could grow to love another, Sansa,” he tucked an errant lock of hair behind her ear.

_(That feels brave, too, to make a claim on her feelings like that. She doesn’t correct him, doesn’t even startle at his words.)_

“Could I?” She rolled to her back though her hand stayed resting on his torso, “And what about that? Would he love me back?”

It sounded like a flight of whimsy, but she didn’t smile.

Tyrion rolled his eyes, “Name someone who doesn’t.”

_(It’s a three-year-old argument. They are in front of the fire though it’s died down now to spitting embers—_

_“Sansa, he only did that because he was in love with you.”_

_“What?”_

_“You seriously never considered that the Hound loved you?”_

_“No. I mean—”_

_His laugh is loud and long, “The whole of Westeros has been in love with you at one point or another.”_

_She frowns at him like he’s just said something very improper. It reminds him of when they were married._

_He continues, “Theon Greyjoy—in love with you.”_

_“We were raised together—”_

_“Doesn’t matter, darling, in love with you. Jon Snow—”_

_“He is my brother!”_

_“Your_ Targaryen _brother. He was definitely, most likely in love with you at some point during your childhood.” He’s only partially teasing her. He’s seen the way Jon looks at her. It’s not the way he looked at Dany, full of lust and unbridled passion, but it’s not the way one looks at their sister either. He almost chokes on his own thoughts—as if he has any knowledge of how a brother looks on a sister._

_“That is revolting, Tyrion.”_

_“Littlefinger.”_

_She does not object to that._

_“Margaery Tyrell.”_

_“Margaery—”_

_“In love with you. Completely smitten.”_

_“How do you know all this?”_

_“What, you think I don’t recognize the signs?”)_

“What would _we_ do?” Sansa wrinkled her nose, “I don’t think my husband would take kindly to being cuckolded.”

He gave a weak chuckle, “No, I suppose not but you’ll be so in love, you won’t even notice that I’m gone.”

She turned her head, her eyes were wide and sad, “Don’t say that Tyrion. You know better than that.”

_(He finds, with surprise, that he does.)_

\--

_(He pulls her to his chamber, “Why are you telling me this?”_

_She stands in his chamber, tall and proud. So very different than the woman who a few nights before had sat on the floor with him and told him all about her love of lemon cakes._

_“I know better than most what makes a tyrant. Jon is the rightful heir, an out.”_

_“An out?”_

_“You’re afraid of her, Tyrion. Not of her power, not of her dragons, but of_ her _. Of what she is willing to do.”_

_He will not respond to this. He cannot believe Sansa’s nerve—she touches his hand and he cannot help but look at her face._

_“I know that fear, I’ve felt it. She is very inspiring. Her goals are beyond admirable but what has she done to work towards them in Westeros? What’s her plan?” There’s more than a hint of pettiness, “She’s not an administrator. I heard bits of what happened in Mereen—the riots, the rebellions—”_

_“Which she quelled.”_

_“Did she? Or was that your diplomacy and her fireworks? What is happening there right now? She has left an unstable region alone to conquer new shores. Broke the chains and the wheel and then left the whole lot for another to re-forge it. What is stopping her from doing that to Westeros?”_

_He sighs._

_“Think on Cersei’s child. Another Myrcella or Tommen. What will she do to them?”_

_“She would never hurt a child,” Tyrion says firmly._

_She does not respond for a long while, simply squeezes his hand._

_“You are loyal, and I admire that very much, Tyrion, I truly do. But you must decide where your loyalty should lie—is it with her? Or is it with the rest of us?”)_

\--

Later that afternoon, Tyrion was still in her chambers, still in bed. It was a risk, she knew, but she cannot bring herself to care today. _Let them find us,_ she thought as she rolled over to her stomach, crossing her legs in the air, _let them know, for certain, what we do._

Tyrion propped himself up against the headboard and stretched. His shoulders released and popped. He gazed down the length of her body. The scars on her back gleamed silver in the afternoon light.

_(“Do they hurt?” he asks, running his finger along the thick knot of pinked reformed skin at the top of her right shoulder blade._

_“No.”_

_Still, she winces when he traces the lines around her back to her ribs.)_

“Jon is coming in three days.”

Tyrion hummed in response before asking, “What do you think he will do?”

“Whatever’s honorable,” Sansa said.

“Is that to say that you have no idea at all?”

\--

_(The night before they leave for King’s Landing, he comes to her chamber. She is sewing, head bent over a scrap of cloth, but his entrance does little to break her focus._

_“Have you been drinking?” she asks quietly as she snips a thread with a tiny pair of scissors._

_He doesn’t answer her, so she continues, “I heard council did not go in your favor today.”_

_He swallows thickly, “She’s going to try him. She said she wouldn’t.” He breaks off to prevent tears, “As soon as we get to King’s Landing.”_

_“He did murder her father,” Sansa says lightly and rethreads her needle._

_“He’s my brother,” it comes out a wail, plaintive._

_“I know,” it sounds like comfort. “What shall you do?”_

_“I don’t know.”_

_Sansa smiled at him sadly, knowingly, “Speak with Jon.”)_

\--

They roused themselves just in time to go to supper. Tyrion helped with her laces. He went first. She waited, re-pinning her hair.

On her way to the dining hall, she caught Lord Glover in the hallway. She pulled him to aside, “I have considered your proposal. Yes.”

Glover’s face split into a grin, “Very good, Your Grace.”

\--

_(The morning after he came to her chamber, after he talks with her a while longer, after he talks to Varys, and then Jon, and tears have been shed, and plans made, the whole party: the Dragon Queen, three traitors, a chained Kingslayer, a weeping lady-knight, and all their attendants gather in Winterfell’s courtyard. Sansa descends to see them off, dressed in implacable black. She hands him a going away gift, a package wrapped in paper, which he opens, alone in the litter, after Varys has dozed off. He realizes that it was what she had been stitching the night before: a handkerchief bordered with grey-white lions and red-black direwolves, both crowned in gold.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Featuring:   
> -Consent--including marital consent--is Sexy! Trope  
> -More of my TEDTalk on how s8 could have worked--Jaime leave Brienne? Bah. No more on-screen Sansa/Tyrion convos after those intense crypt scenes? Humbug.   
> -The reveal of my secret multi-shipper Sansa heart. I mean, Sanrion is obviously my main ship but I could be convinced to accept her with almost anyone?? 
> 
> Hope you enjoy!!! :)


	11. and the winds started up

They sit at opposite ends of the dining table. Sansa had adopted the habit of her father and had invited a crofter to sit with them that evening and was in deep conversation about the availability of wheat seed.

Tyrion had been, by default, sat next to Talisa. Arya had claimed the seat next to Robb and Catelyn was engaged with Lord Manderley. Lord Glover, his wife, Lady Flint, and her husband were making lively conversation about the coming party of wildlings.

“What was the emergency, my Lord?” Talisa asked.

Tyrion nearly choked on his onion pie, he had forgotten about that, “Oh, yes. A message from Ser Brienne, the head of the Kingsguard.”

“What news did she have?” Talisa asked.

“Oh yes, Talisa told me you were called away suddenly, I hope everything is alright.” Robb said.

Tyrion said smoothly, “There was a mild issue in the West, near the border. The Queen and I reached a solution quickly.”

“Are you speaking of Brienne of Tarth?” Lady Catelyn called down the table. Tyrion had discovered in the past few days of shared meals that Catelyn had truly excellent hearing.

“Yes, milady,” Tyrion said, “She wrote to me this afternoon.”

“I am glad she is well. She lives in the South now?”

“Yes, head of your son’s Kingsguard, in fact.”

_(Sansa places her hand on Brienne’s shoulder, “Go, Brienne, go to the South. My brother has need of you. Lord Tyrion has need of you.”_

_“My lady—”_

_“My mother enlisted you in her service to protect me and I am enlisting you in mine to protect him.”)_

Robb laughed, “She always was an extraordinary woman.”

“How is she?” Lady Flint joined the conversation. She had taken quite a shine to Brienne on the Northern diplomatic mission to the South, “That delightful son of hers?”

Catelyn exclaimed happily, “She married? I always thought the marriage rules for the Kingsguard were absurd—”

Sansa was still speaking with the crofter, but Tyrion could tell by the slope of her neck that she had shifted her attention to down the table.

“She has not married,” Tyrion said, “The child was born out of wedlock.”

Silence fell across the table.

Lady Flint continued, in what Tyrion could only assume was a way to ease the offense against Lady Catelyn, “Though she had the boy legitimized last year. He’s your heir now, isn’t he?”

“Yes,” Tyrion said shortly.

He could actually see Robb working through the anatomical implications of a child of his and Brienne’s when Sansa interrupted her own conversation to cut in, “Lord Tyrion is very devoted to his nephew. We, in fact, have agreed to foster the boy at Winterfell when he turns ten.”

“His nephew?” Lady Catelyn asked. Her voice was low and controlled. Worse than if she had screamed.

“Galladon is my brother’s child,” Tyrion said. He took a sip of ale. Catelyn’s eyes were boring into him.

_(“I think my house should die with me,” Tyrion says. They burned Jaime’s body today. They had burned Cersei the day before. Sansa is sitting across from him, sewing, and he is nursing a strong Essosi liquor he found in the depths of the kitchens. She’s making what looks like a baby’s cap and it makes him think of Myrcella and Tommen, he repeats, “My house should die with me. No more lions. We should be scourged from the earth.”_

_Sansa ties off her thread and covers his hand with hers, “Brienne’s with child.”)_

Talisa, as usual the peacemaker, asked, “I have heard many tales of the lady knight. I should be well pleased to meet her child. How old is he?”

“Five years, in two moonturns time. He is a favorite of your brother the king,” Tyrion pointedly returned to pie.

_(The day Galladon enters the world, he looks so much like Joffrey that it frightens both him and Sansa. But as he grows, he has his mother’s teeth and his father’s ears and his uncle’s nose and his mother’s father’s chin, and eventually he just looks like himself.)_

“Sounds delightful!” Talisa said, forcing cheer.

Catelyn sniffed.

Conversation quickly moved on, but Tyrion kept catching Robb’s eye.

He excused himself early and made for the library.

\--

“You don’t like her.” Arya’s voice cut the quiet. She was slouched across from Sansa, playing with a penknife.

Tyrion had slunk off to the library after the evening meal and one of Sansa’s maidservants had informed her that Robb had followed him there. Catelyn had pleaded a sore head and had gone to bed early.

“Who?” Sansa was distracted. The crofter had brought up some interesting points about seed distribution and she was trying to amend Lord Manderley’s agricultural proposal.

“Talisa.”

Sansa cocked her head without looking up, “I don’t _know_ her.”

“You don’t like that she likes Tyrion.”

Sansa put down her pen, “Whatever do you mean?”

“The late library discussions. Those are your thing, aren’t they?” Arya propped a defiant foot on the edge of Sansa’s desk.

“Are you saying that I’m jealous?”

Arya shrugged, “I’m just saying that you don’t like that she spends unattended time with your lover.”

“Arya.” A warning.

“An observation is all.” Arya twirled the knife, threw it and caught it, blade side down.

“Do you really think that Tyrion is so moronic as to cuckhold my brother in his own home?”

“Oh, no, I think Tyrion is slavishly devoted to you. But I also happen to think that you don’t like to share.”

“I think you’re confusing me and Tyrion with you and Lord Baratheon.”

“No need to get your crown knocked out of place, just an opinion.”

They were thankfully interrupted by the maid who had followed Robb to the library. She had heard parts of a conversation with Robb, plans for a private meeting with Tyrion on the morrow.

Arya watched the maid disappear out the door, “I thought that you were stepping down as queen.”

“I am not out of power quite yet,” Sansa said, returning to her papers.

“And you intend to never be,” Arya sighed wearily.

“I intend to not split our house, as you requested.”

“And how will you accomplish that?” Arya tilted her head and the candle’s sputtering light hollowed her cheeks in shadow, carving her face to look more skeleton than warm human.

Sansa did not bother to respond. Arya prodded again, “Sansa—”

“Robb discussed marrying you to a Dornishman. Did you know that?” She set her pen down with perhaps more force than was necessary. She barely recognized her voice as her own, it sounded sharp and bitter and familiar. _(“Cersei,” Petyr says from somewhere behind her, “You sound like Cersei.”)_

Arya grinned, “As if he could make me, I—”

Sansa went on matter-of-factly, “No, you most likely could slip away in the night, unnoticed. He may not even care. He may, however, not see the problem with arranging the marriage of a Northern noblewoman, Lady Flint’s eldest daughter, perhaps, to the Lord of the Stormlands. It would be an advantageous match, no doubt, one I have long considered and one that I have held off on out of respect for you.”

“Sansa—”

“Robb wants to marry me off again to another stranger, Arya, a Dornishman with ten illegitimate children. That would also be a good match, a prosperous arrangement. Except that the bride cannot stand to be alone with a man she does not know and cannot bear children because too much moon tea withered her womb. He understood, of course, that this would be difficult for me, but it was my duty.”

_(“Was this Ramsay?” Arya asks. Her fingers hover over Sansa’s shoulders. The scars are still bright and tender._

_Sansa shudders, “He sold me to them. Baelish. I trusted him and he sold me to him.”_

_Arya’s face pinches, “Then he shall die for his crimes.”)_

Arya eyed her, “You have found a way to do this without injury to Robb? Or Talisa?”

Sansa nodded. Arya looked uneasy but was satisfied.

_(The next day, Sansa ensures that the wine that Robb insists on serving Tyrion, is carried in by that observant maidservant. She shakes her head when she hears what they discussed.)_

\--

Tyrion needed to find a new spot to hole himself up in Winterfell. It was Robb in the library tonight.

“Lord Tyrion,” he did not feign surprise which Tyrion appreciated, “Talisa told me that you come here in the evenings.”

_(What he does not say: “When I’m not fucking your sister.”)_

He said: “Yes, most evenings.”

_(What he does not add: “Although that chair that you’re sitting in has seen things that would make you slit my throat.”)_

He added: “You have an excellent collection here.”

“Thank you,” Robb sat across from him.

Robb had Sansa’s directness _(and eyes, though Tyrion definitely does not dwell on_ that _),_ “You spend a lot of time with my sister.”

Tyrion’s mind wiped clean in panic, “I am Hand to King Bran and she is still Queen in the North.”

“Yes, but Sansa will not be queen for very much longer. She will no longer be the person you report to when you receive communications from the South.”

_(Thank the Gods it was just political intrigue.)_

“Ah, I am sorry if that caused offense, Her Grace received the letter first. We should have included you in the discussion.”

“Yes. Next time do.”

Tyrion nodded.

“You seem to be very fond of Sansa,” Robb leaned forward, less commanding, more friendly.

“We have known each other a long time, my lord.”

“You were married,” Robb says, mouth laughing.

Tyrion’s responding chortle is sardonic and genuine, “In name only, my Lord.”

“It must have hurt though when she rejected you,” Robb said.

“We were forced into the arrangement; your sister was no more than a child.” Tyrion tugged on a loose thread in the chair’s upholstery.

“Still.”

Tyrion searched his face. Robb was the same age he had been when he shot his father, although Robb wore his years more lightly, “What are you implying, my lord?”

“Nothing, Lord Tyrion, I just think that we could perhaps reach an arrangement that suits both the North and the South. A new partnership without the burdens of the past.”

Tyrion twisted the thread about his finger, it bit into his knuckle.

_(It was meant to be a slight to Sansa. It feels like a slight to him. The bitter, vengeful, lusty Imp. He knows it is not Robb’s intention but still it makes him feel tired.)_

“I understand that Sansa has been unwilling to accept naval taxes. I see your reason, though, you need to fund the upkeep of your ports, repair of the King’s ships. When I am king, we may be able to reopen discussions.”

_(Robb was not a bad judge of character, he decided, not bad at all to be able to perceive the pain of his and Sansa’s marriage. But he was like so many others: he was distracted by the wrong thing.)_

Tyrion stroked his beard, “An interesting proposal, my Lord, one I like very much. And what would you want in return?”

Robb smiled, “We will discuss that in future meetings. Private meetings.”

Bait.

_(He has no idea what to counter with, Tyrion thought first, before it occurred to him that Robb might have every intention of asking for something absurd like no border defenses or free agricultural support. Then, a third, that this is but a hook to win over the South—)_

Robb outstretched his hand, “I believe we will have a long, lucrative friendship.”

Tyrion did not hesitate. He took Robb’s hand, grinning, “Of course, my Lord.”

Robb made to go but as he reached the door, he turned and said casually, “If my sister approaches you about any private matter, let me know.”

Tyrion did not have to pretend surprise, “Brotherly concern, my lord?”

Robb smirked and left without answer. _(A Stark face is not structured for smirking.)_

_(They meet the next day, without Sansa, with wine, and Robb’s proposition is increased defense along the border between their kingdoms but with the majority of the fortifications to be held under Northern control. Tyrion almost laughs. It is a proposal that makes perfect and no sense all at once. A military display to a non-existent enemy, brute force to combat the epidemic of poaching and smuggling. It reeks of the Stark high-handedness that he remembers his father railing against, but it is tinged with Robb’s own special ruthlessness, a ruthlessness he will not tell Sansa reminds him of her.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, Jaime's still dead :( but there's a baby!! Yay!! Galladon and Brienne don't make an appearance in this fic but will in future parts of this verse. :) 
> 
> I had to split this original chapter into two parts, so if it comes across as a bit filler than that's because--it is! The angsty Sanrion pining is in the next installment. ;) 
> 
> In other news, I've officially finished writing the back half of this fic with the exception of editing, polishing, etc. Yipee! I'm moving on to work on other parts of the series. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy! :)


	12. she loves full and true, as a fighting bequest

Arya left for bed and Sansa could not sleep. She gets up, shouldered on her robe, and left for the library.

He was still there, dozing lightly, covered head to toe in a thick fur, swaddled in his favorite chair that had been pulled precariously close to the fire.

_(The year before: “I hate the cold,” he whines as he buries himself deeper into the blankets._

_“Come now, the maesters say it will be spring soon.” She looks at him through her eyelashes and smirks._

_He grunts._

_She turns to him more fully, tugging on him until he hovers above her, “Until then, we must find other ways of getting warm.”)_

She went to him, bending over to caress the side of his face, “Tyrion.”

He fluttered awake.

“Your Grace?” he murmured sleepily.

“Lord Hand,” she kissed him, long and lazy. She cuffed her wrists about his nape and his hands found her waist. When they broke from each other, she placed gentle kisses along the bridge of his nose and temples, warm and soft, she climbed into his lap, her nightgown rucked up around her, pressing right against each other—

_(It’s a compulsion, she decides, a compulsion to ruin good and happy things.)_

“What did Robb want?” 

Fortunately, Tyrion laughed and tugged at the front lacing of her night dress, “I was wondering when you’d find out about that. An hour is a record for even you, darling.”

He loosened the nightgown’s neckline, so her breasts were visible. He pulled the dress down farther, almost off her shoulders. Her chest flushed and pebbled in the cold air. He took a nipple in his mouth. It was an unexpected pressure and she bucked in his lap with a hissing breath.

“So desperate, Your Grace, it’s almost as if we hadn’t _fucked,”_ she bit her lip at his vulgarity, “all afternoon.”

She let him continue his attention for a time, cupping the upper swell of her thighs, mouthing along her breasts and neck. He was hard and insistent, pressed against her thigh and she just wanted—

“You haven’t answered my question.”

Tyrion sighed, “Sansa—” he thought better of what he was about to say and tried again, “He thinks he is to be king. He is seeking out the representative of the neighboring kingdom. It is completely appropriate.”

“And what did—” She is interrupted by Tyrion thrusting sharply upwards and she let out a whimper.

“Are you asking me to be a spy? Because, Sansa, that is just—”

It is her turn to interject with a swivel of her hips, he choked on his words.

She pouted _(which he knows she knows he finds absolutely endearing),_ “You’re not answering my questions, my Lord.”

Tyrion grinned up at her and elected to return his attention to her collarbone. She palmed his chest and pushed him back slightly. He obeyed but grumbled, “Fine.”

“What did Robb want?”

“He had a very interesting proposal on naval trade.”

Sansa pursed her lips, “And?”

“And it’s better than yours. Probably.” He curled a lock of her hair around his finger and tugged gently.

“You would say that about any trade proposal that wasn’t mine.”

He chuckled, “Perhaps.”

Silence fell between them, Sansa’s brow furrowed, and she sat back on her heels in thought. Tyrion hung his head, tired, the moment of seduction passed. For a long few minutes, it was just them and the faint crackle of the dying fire and the distant gasp of another spring storm stirring out the window.

Sansa split the silence, “What side is Bran on?”

Tyrion had been staring beyond Sansa, over her shoulder into the flames, dreaming, and he did not respond immediately. When he did, he did not take his eyes off the hearth, “I have been instructed to stay out of the wolf den.”

“That’s Davos talking. What did my brother say?”

He met her eyes then, “He told me to make sure the pack survived.”

_(At least he thought that was what he meant.)_

She rested her cheek on top of his head, he nestled his face in her neck, she whispered into his curls, “Do you have any advice on how to do that?”

“Befriend Talisa,” His voice rumbled against her pulse point. The vibrations made her rock down on his lap again and she could feel, with satisfaction, his hardness begin to return.

“Did you get that from your late-night talks?” It sounded wounding even to her own ears.

Tyrion pulled back. She expected anger or shame or—but he was mirthful, “Are you jealous, darling?”

She bristled at the condescension, “No.” It came out too quickly.

Tyrion was gleeful. He kissed her shoulder, “Alright.”

“But why?”

“I have a feeling that your lovely good-sister with whom I have spent many, many, _many—”_ he drew out the last word, “late nights is rather lonely and in need of companionship.”

Sansa frowned but settled to rest against him again, “I am not jealous.”

“If you say so.” He chuckled again.

_(It’s an addiction, she thinks, to crumpling any peace they find together in her fist like paper.)_

“What side are you on?”

Tyrion pulled away from her. His face was soft, eyes wide, “Don’t do this, Sansa.”

Her eyes narrowed at him.

_(It’s a reflex, she tries to stop it, but she’s already snapping to like a battle-weary soldier.)_

“You would support Robb?” she said, disbelieving. She pushed herself up and away. His hands clutched quickly at hers to prevent her from completely disengaging from his body.

“I support Bran,” he said.

The library was suddenly too hot, the flames too dazzling, the shadows too quicksilver. The storm screamed at them outside.

“After everything we’ve done, everything you’ve _said_ , you would support Robb over me, you would choose him—”

_(He is known to the Six Kingdoms as the Kingmaker. Gets the credit for Jon and Bran both down there. But there is another name, one that nobody dares whisper in his presence: Queenbreaker. Not Queenslayer. Breaker. Like he is a god who holds her and Daenerys and Cersei in his palm, then snaps them in half when he is done.)_

“ _If_ he somehow, against all the Gods, becomes king, I will not have a choice, Sansa,” the command in his voice was rare, at least when directed to her, it nearly froze her. Not quite.

“You would allow me to be sold off like cattle, I _gave_ myself to you and you are just—”

His face went still.

_(Her rage is always, always, always hot, hot, hot, like wildfire, green, piping, leaves her spluttering, red faced, fists clenching. His rage is always, always, always cold, cold, cold, words spinning out of him like ice-tipped arrows. She forgets this, that he is a murderer, that he killed a woman that he loved, mixes it up with his sweet words and parcels—)_

“You do not get to lecture me on this,” he said, whispered more like, “I am not, for all that you wish to pretend, your subject. You are not the only one who has to sacrifice for ‘the good of their people.’” He did a crude impression of her, mimicking the words she told him that first visit, “I am the agent of a foreign crown. I have no stake in what Stark sits on the throne or if the King in the North is a Stark at all, just that I get what I need for my _actual_ King. Your crown means nothing to me.”

She tried to wrench her hands from his, but his grip was too strong. Kinslaying hands. A moment. He let her go.

“May the Seven help him if Robb tries to marry you off,” he barked a laugh, caustic, bitter, she flinched, “We had a chance, after the war, I _gave_ you a chance and you decided not to take it. You had our marriage annulled, ensured that the gods in the North and that our septon and the whole world knew that we were no longer married, that you gave back your Imp husband, that you chose a throne and your kingdom over me. And I never complained, I wrote the support letters myself. But with that, you relinquished any protection that I could provide you. That’s the problem with choices, Sansa, they have consequences. And in this, you have no one to blame for putting you in this position but yourself.” His rage seemed to ebb somewhat, and he rubbed his hand over his face, “I have loved you for so long, Sansa—”

Sensing a tender spot in his armor, she shot back, “If you loved me, you would support me anyway.”

The match sparked again, his eyes flint, “Don’t you dare, Sansa, make this about whether or not I love you. You know better than that.”

_(She finds, with surprise, that she does.)_

_(She also knows that this is the ghost that sits between them at night, that shadows every time they meet: if Bran made her an enemy, Tyrion would march against her, no matter how much he loved her, no matter how much she has tried to ensnare him with words and touches, her attentions would only make their separation more bloody, slow him down, wreak more devastation. It does not change that Bran had given him a chance and she had banished them to whole different countries.)_

The silence stretched between them, an inexhaustible plain, both staring at each other, hard and unyielding, wondering how this night had unraveled so quickly. At some point, Tyrion broke, his eyes splintered from anger to sadness. It made a rock rise in her chest and knock against her throat. He tried to reach up at her, comfort her, she jolted away as if struck, he settled to fisting his hands in her skirt, “You and I, Sansa. It was always going to be a tragedy.”

_(The words have been locked inside him since the very first moment that he told her that he loved her. His next breath was going to tell her that it was hopeless, but she had kissed him, and he quite forgot his objections.)_

She must have looked stricken because his voice turned gentle, “I thought you knew.”

She turned her face away. Her chest was still exposed, flushed, looked bruised by shadows. She concentrated on the carpet, the slight inconsistencies in the pattern, the places where the fibers were too big and burst from their woven bindings, the fraying at the corner.

_(Arya, Jon, Mother, Robb, they all leave, always, always, and now he is too, slipping from her grasp. She wants to tell him again, wants to say it, doesn’t have the energy—instead—)_

“Does this mean this is over?” Her voice was quiet.

He went for her hand again and she let him, he pressed a kiss to it, and she just about wept, “No, my love, not this time.”

\--

_(It strikes her later, lying in bed, trying and failing to sleep that it reminds her of a conversation. It was years ago, Tyrion’s second visit to Winterfell as Lord Hand. She had almost forgotten how it began._

_She sits in her solar. It is late, the castle’s activities long tucked away but she is still awake. She is sorting through marriage proposals when he enters. He’s due to leave the day after next. They had already reestablished the companionship they had found the year before, solidified the friendship created in the interim letters flown between them. He’s even touched her again, shared her bed, at her urging. He had kissed her this afternoon and she almost told him everything that had been roiling in her heart but he had stopped her, pressed his fingers to her swollen lips and hushed her, “No, Sansa, please.”_

_Now he is back, she cannot tell if he’s been drinking or not. His glassy expression says yes, but his steady gait says no. She invites him in, and he sits across from her, where Arya would sit if she wasn’t traipsing across the unknown. They talk of this and that and the conversation turns to her marriage prospects and his marriage prospects and suddenly she loses the thread of discussion._

_His face, his eyes especially, are so expressive. He is not making the effort to control himself tonight. A shadow passes over his whole countenance when she mentions her cousin Robyn, turns thunderous at the suggestion of Margarey’s third cousin, and then broken at Lord Manderley’s first choice: Jon Snow._

_She thinks it quite funny, the thought of her and Jon together,_ married. _Not even repulsive, just amusing. Tyrion, however, deflates. It sparks recognition—_

_“Are you jealous, Tyrion?”_

_He gets angry, defensive, they fight. Their fury with each other shredding the silence of the night. It is ugly that argument—years later, she could still feel the ghost of her rage stutter in her chest like an old wound. They carry on and on and on._

_Everything up to that point had been so incremental, slowly stitching themselves together, healing. Then this. This abrupt amputation._

_She calls him a kinslayer._

_He calls her a phantom._

_It is then that she asks about Shae._

_It is then he asks about Petyr._

_It is then that he tells her about Tysha._

_It is then that she tells him about Ramsay._

_They both weep, tears streaming from their eyes like twin rivers. She feels like she is drowning and that she is drowning him too, with her, in the torrents of grief tumbling from her like she is a waterfall._

_It goes on and on and on until dawn peeks cautiously into the solar and just as it began without warning, it ends._

_They had stormed to her bed chamber at some point and now he sits slumped on the edge of her great bed, head cradled by his trembling hands, the picture of agony, “Sansa, what is it that you_ want _from me?”_

_She is too exhausted, relieved, boneless to answer and so she sits beside him and wraps herself about him. They lie back in tandem, his head cushioned on her breast, her hands twisted in his hair._

_It’s then that she tells him, and he cannot hush her. Does not even try.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy! 
> 
> T-minus two chapters until Jon arrives! Yay!


	13. tell me where have the saints gones, oh where is the pull

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PSA: There are slight mentions of alcohol abuse in this chapter, as in Tyrion's depression and use of alcohol as a coping mechanism as well as non-explicit mentions of Sansa's abuse. Read with care. <3

It was two days until Jon’s arrival. Sansa had sent a raven warning him of Robb’s return. His reply had been concerned, ‘We will speak more upon my arrival. With love, Jon.’

\--

_(“Your crown means nothing to me,” he had said. How could she forgive that little cruelty?_

_It reminds her of something, seven years ago: “Oh, Sansa—”_

_“I believe you mean ‘Your Grace.’”_

_“I am not speaking with her at the moment.”)_

\--

Nothing much happened after the argument. Anticlimactic, really. She sunk back to his lap and he wrapped his arms about her. It felt like healing.

_(Too old, too tired, too much else to fight the other.)_

They separated, by habit, at the waking clangs of the courtyard.

She readied herself for the day, but she could even tell herself that she was distracted, sluggish. Tyrion’s words had branded themselves on her, the impossibility of them, his sureness in their inevitability. Her own doubt weighed in on her, pulling at her attention.

And then there were the practical considerations of the day: increasing surveillance on Robb, last preparations for Jon’s visit, petitions, making sure Lord Glover did not give the game away. Her head was woolly, the skin around her eyes stretched with the effort of keeping them open. She just wanted to rest. She placed her head against the cool ivory top of her vanity and closed her eyes for a moment. It was then that her mother chose to enter.

Catelyn had come a few times to her room, to do her hair as she had done that first morning. They talked of nothing much—Catelyn had assigned herself to assist Jeyne in the running of the household, so they focused mostly on that: menus, inventories, the possibility of ordering more beeswax for candles. It was nice, Sansa thought, to have someone else to help. Someone else who understood the need for economy, who could manage the staff, who could give Jeyne a chance to sit occasionally. They did not talk much about anything else and that was nice, too—Catelyn had made little comment on her decision to allow Robb to have the throne, on the lack of sept, on Arya’s coldness, or whether or not she ever visited the crypts.

_(Well, Sansa knew that she had because one of her spies had told her, but she thought it distasteful to mention.)_

Always courteous, Catelyn usually knocked. Not today. Sansa’s head shot up and she hurriedly tightened her robe about her shoulders.

“Oh, I am sorry, Sansa,” Catelyn said.

“No, no, Mother, come in. I did not sleep well last night is all.”

Catelyn crossed the room and took up her brush and began on Sansa’s hair, “I will ask the maester for some milk of poppy.”

“Oh no, I don’t think that is necessary, just worried about Jon’s visit.”

“What do wildlings eat anyway?”

Sansa sighed, “Food, most likely.”

Catelyn pursed her lips and Sansa could feel herself shrinking with her rudeness, “I apologize, I am just tired.”

Catelyn nodded.

Then it happened.

Sansa did not know how—some perfect synchronization of her turning slightly in her seat and her mother shifting her neck to drape her hair over her other shoulder—but her robe slipped off her right shoulder. She noticed it immediately, felt the naked tingle of chilled air dance across her shoulder, but she was still too slow in replacing it. Catelyn caught the edge of her robe as she pulled it up.

There were two things. The first was that the way that the robe falls meant that the feathery beginnings of her scars were visible. They were small, light, innocuous, just a suggestion of the lattice pattern that spanned down her back. The second was that her robe fell and gaped slightly on the upper slope of her breast, where a purpled love mark, two days old, burned brightly.

_(“Tyrion!” she exclaims, as she reties her nightgown, tripping her way off his lap, fingering the mark._

_He shrugs and smirks, “How low were planning to wear your gown in this weather anyway?”)_

Her breath stopped and she froze. Two secrets exposed in one bare shoulder.

Catelyn noticed the love mark first. How could she miss it?

Her voice was quiet, and Sansa wanted to shrivel up into a husk, “You know I did not believe it when I overheard it from the maids.”

Sansa did not respond.

Catelyn went on, “I assume this is from Lord Tyrion.”

Their eyes met in the mirror and though Sansa had tried to still her face, Catelyn must have caught something there, and nodded in her own confirmation, “I do not need to tell you that what you are doing is dangerous.”

Sansa shook her head.

“Is he why you have not remarried?” Catelyn demanded.

Sansa shook her head again.

It was then that Catelyn saw the scars. Her eyes widened. She touched the edge of them, and Sansa jerked her shoulder away. The robe only dropped lower. Catelyn gasped. The worst of them sat right on her right shoulder blade, a knot of mangled skin that had healed hard and lumped.

“Sansa—”

“It’s an old injury,” Sansa said quickly. She wrenched the robe back in place. She was breathing hard now, feeling bile rising in her chest and choking her.

“Sansa.”

“I can’t—”

“Was it the Bolton boy?”

Sansa looked down, covered her face with her trembling hands.

_(Out of control, spinning, spiraling, whirligig, she is out of control—)_

“I heard those rumors too,” Sansa flinched but her mother pressed on. “of what happened to him—”

“Just don’t tell Robb,” she managed.

“Sansa.”

“Please, just don’t tell Robb. Any of it. I cannot—"

Her mother placed a hand on her hair, soothed, “Alright. Alright.”

“I need to go; I have petitions soon.”

_(Straighten spine, brush away tears, practice smile. Back in control. Get back in control.)_

Catelyn nodded and picked up the brush again. Sansa went to stop her, but Catelyn shook her off, “Let me do this, Sansa. Just let me do this.”

And she did.

\--

Tyrion slept late into the morning. He had little appetite when he arose and so left his quarters immediately for his meeting with Robb.

_(Robb offers him wine and he takes it because he has a headache and the wine is so cool and sweet and he misses its taste. Davos watches his drinking in the South, Sansa in the North, like he truly is a half-man, never learned to control his appetites, needs people to do it for him._

_Robb has not, will not warm to him. Is relying on him to play Sansa’s jealous lost husband, to want to make deals behind her back. Might as well indulge._

_The first cup feels like comfort, feels like habit._

_He does not even notice the second sliding down his throat except for the thought that if he sees Sansa later, he will have to wash out his mouth. That if he sees Arya, she will tell Sansa. That the maid who served them will tell Sansa anyway. How did he become so beholden to the opinion of a woman he did not even serve?_

_The third and fourth he drinks after Robb has gone. They make him ill, sours his stomach, causes him push the flagon away, tip over his cup, leave the room.)_

After that, he went to the godswood.

_(He thinks on Sansa, on their argument the night before, her accusations spitting from her like she was a wounded wolf. He had thought she had known. Truly.)_

Bran’s one demand during their renovations of King’s Landing had been the extension of the godswood. It was easy enough to grant, though it got little use by any of the residents. Tyrion found the king sometimes, sheltered by the great spreading weirwood, eyes milky.

_(She had settled against him after they had finished arguing. Clung to him, really, as if she wanted their ribs to knit together. It makes him remember the aftermath of the first time they had lain together, curling together as if they could fuse together if they so willed it.)_

He crouched beneath the weirwood, ignoring its leaking eyes, leaning against the peeling flecked bark. He understood the allure of the place, the peace. The ground was still damp with the previous night’s rain, he could see a few holy branches ripped from their sockets scattered about.

_(“Sansa,” he said as the earliest sounds of the castle awakening filtered in, “My love.” He nudged her awake, detached the fingers still pinching the collar of his night shirt. She kissed him good-bye and then left.)_

He closed his eyes, trying to rest, sober now. The sun was strong that day and he had to shield himself before it burned his skin.

_(Five years ago: upon his return to King’s Landing from the North, he sinks into a melancholia. He attends his meetings and then locks himself in his room. He drinks. No one seems to know what to do with him when he is in one of these states. No one ever has._

_Brienne brings Galladon and he tries to smile, Bronn offers him a good time but it makes him sick to think on whores, finally after two fortnights, Varys arrives, perfumed and powdered, looking like an exotic bird amongst the wasteland of Tyrion’s chambers._

_He says nothing until finally: “It is no easy thing to be loved by a queen. It would corrupt the soul of any man.”_

_It’s a gross miscalculation, a rare misstep for the Spider._

_It’s not the Queen or her love or his love or anything to do with that. He’s not bloody Jon Snow._

_It’s everything else.)_

“Lord Tyrion?” He startled awake. It was Catelyn Stark. He scrambled to his feet, brushing woodland detritus off of his breeches and doublet.

“I am sorry, milady. You caught me unawares.”

She stood, silhouetted by the noon-day sun, so in contrast that he could truly see her face.

“Walk with me, Lord Tyrion,” an order more than request.

“Of course.” He fell in step with her and she went to turn along the path.

“I have been meaning to ask you more about Bran,” she said.

“He is well and a good king. A just king. Your husband would have been proud of him.”

 _(He knows that it is not quite what she is looking for, but it is not his place to comfort her when it comes to her children.)_

Catelyn nodded slightly and then glanced to the sky as if checking for rain clouds before saying, “I have never apologized for my treatment of you all those years ago.”

“No need, Lady Catelyn, it is all forgotten.” _(It is most certainly_ not. _)_

They circled a copse of towering evergreens, Catelyn kept her gaze tilted upwards, “My daughter thinks highly of you.”

_(What he does not say: “I have been in love with her for so long.”)_

He said: “We have been allies for many years.”

_(What he does not add: “I think she might love me back. She said it to me once, long ago.”)_

He added: “She has been a good Queen.”

Catelyn hummed in response. It reminded him of Sansa. Catelyn said, “Though it seems that we will soon have a new king.”

“So it seems.”

“And what do you think of that, my lord?”

_(“What side are you on?” she asks, and he can see her heart, suspended mid-way in the air, before it smashes on the ground.)_

“Of what, my lady?”

“My daughter letting her brother have the throne.”

“Well, it seems that the agreement is that it is his by rights.”

They fell into a brief, awkward silence until Catelyn broke it, “Sansa was always the best behaved of all the children. Distanced her from the others really. Never a talented liar. I honestly cannot remember ever having to remind her to do a task or her lessons. She could fight with Arya, but she was always good to Rickon and Bran. There was one time, however, when Bran cut all the stitching for a dress, she was making for her nameday feast. She was always very talented in that area as I am sure you know, and she had worked on this gown for three days and three nights together. He didn’t really mean to; he was barely four; but I have never seen her so furious. She yelled at him until he was crying, ‘All my work,’ she said, ‘and you’ve ruined it with a stupid pair of scissors.’”

The pair turned a corner to the approach the outer edge of the godswood where the rocky path rambled down to the glass gardens.

Catelyn continued, “What I mean to say is that I do not claim to know my daughter well but from what I have seen or heard of her here and what I know of her from before, I am surprised that she would allow Robb to return so easily to his place.”

He offered her a hand and she descended to the path.

“I am not sure what you mean, Lady Catelyn. I believe you overestimate my intimacy with your daughter.”

Catelyn’s mouth quirked, “I am sure I do not.”

_(What?)_

She took advantage of the length of her legs and increased her pace, leaving Tyrion to jog to catch up.

“My lady, whatever you are implying, I can assure you—”

Catelyn stopped abruptly, pivoting to face him, peering down her aristocratic nose at him, “I advised Robb against marrying Talisa. I knew that it would cost us the war, but he was so like Ned. Whenever he gets a thought into his head, especially a thought of honor, he has trouble shaking it, no matter who tells him nay.”

Tyrion tried again, “My lady, I cannot tell you—”

“Robb lost us our home and my children. He regrets it bitterly, of course, and I am sure he has learned but he still made his choices. And I made mine. I followed him and my grandchild across the Narrow Sea and left my daughter behind. And she survived, by some blessing of the Mother. It would be a shame if she threw away that blessing for an Imp.”

_(What in the—oh.)_

“I assure you, Lady Stark, she would not dare.”

“Good,” Catelyn said, turning again to stride briskly towards the glass gardens, gleaming in the afternoon sun, she called over her shoulder, “Are you coming, Lord Tyrion?”

He hurried to match her pace again.

Catelyn sighed heavily. So like Sansa, “She really was the best behaved of all the children.”

\--

Sansa was trying very hard to ignore the mess that Arya was making. She was peeling an apple and allowing the fragments of skin and small bits of flesh to drop and collect on Sansa’s rug. It had been an exhausting day and Arya had convinced her to leave her desk and sit by the fire.

“He said your love was a tragedy?” Arya said incredulously, “Now _that_ is a bit dramatic.”

“He’s right,” Sansa said, “We will never be together, really, he will always have to leave—”

“You two read too many books.” Arya shook her head and carefully stuck her knife into the core of the apple and began to saw it out. All Sansa saw was the spray of juice dotting her armchair.

“Don’t you and Gendry ever have these discussions?”

Arya looked at her skeptically, “No.”

“Never—”

“Not every pair is as histrionic as you and Tyrion,” she scoffed, “A _tragedy_? Just make nice with Bran every now and then, it’s not bloody difficult.” 

They settled into silence except for the thud of Arya’s apple core when it hit the ground.

Sansa eyed the core, before saying, “Mother knows about Ramsay.”

Arya offered her a slice of apple, “How?”

“She came to visit this morning and my robe slipped. She saw my scars.” Where Arya finished her slice up in two big bites, Sansa nibbled the edge.

Arya laughed, “Well, that’s just because you insist on prancing about in those Myrish lace scraps.”

“She cried,” Sansa lolled her head to look at Arya. 

“Good.” Arya punctuated her declaration with a crisp snap of apple.

“She said you haven’t been around much.”

“No. I have not,” Arya said, “Crews don’t organize themselves; ships don’t stock themselves, and bodies don’t train themselves.”

“Are you angry with them?”

“Angry? No.” Arya scoffed, “Once Jon arrives, I’m sure it will all be happy family.”

“Sarcasm does not become you.” Sansa said primly.

“Denial does not become you.” Arya shot back. She softened slightly, “Doesn’t mean that I want to tear us apart with political plots. We’re not Lannisters, no matter our failings.” 

Sansa settled back in her chair to watch the flames.

“How did you know? That Robb would want to become king when he returned?”

Sansa’s face looked feline in the firelight, “I know men and what they think they deserve.”

Arya finished her apple, letting the last half-bitten slice join the rest of its carcass on the ground, “Fair enough.”

Arya was about to start on the desecration of a peach when Tyrion knocked. Neither sister rose to greet him except for Arya who said, rolling her eyes, “Oh look, it’s the tragic Lord Tyrion. Want some peach?”

Sansa glanced out the window, it had grown dark as pitch, “I did not realize it was quite so late.”

Tyrion pulled the stool from her vanity to join them at the flames, accepting Arya’s peach gratefully.

_(She can smell the shadow of stale wine on his breath, cut by mint and oranges, like she knows is in the infused water provided by the kitchens. Heard about the morning. Curses Robb and his ignorance. But Tyrion’s face is clear, alert. She puts her hand in his, even with Arya there, enfolds it with her own.)_

They talked of nothing of importance: Arya’s plans to sail north which Tyrion insisted was where he had read there lived sea serpents, Galladon’s training regimen which Arya insisted was much too limited even if the boy was only five, speculations about Jon’s mysterious wildling lover which Sansa insisted was none of their concern.

Sansa was ready to evict one or both of them so she could sleep when there was another knock.

“Doesn’t seem much point in keeping private chambers if anyone can just come to them,” Arya grumbled.

Sansa ignored her and called. “Who is it?”

“It’s Mother.”

Arya, gesturing to Tyrion, breathed, “Shit!”

Sansa said, “She knows,” just as Tyrion said, “She’s figured it out.”

They exchanged quizzical glances before Sansa called, “Come in, Mother.”

Catelyn entered. She started at seeing all three of them huddled about the fire, “Sorry to disturb you…all.”

Tyrion plastered on a grin and straightened on his stool, removing his hands from where they had been tangled with Sansa’s. Arya, nonplussed, returned to her peach. Sansa said graciously, “No worry, Mother, is there something specific we can help you with?”

Catelyn held up a small vial, “I brought some peppermint oil. It helps with,” she gestured lamely to her neck.

“Love marks,” Tyrion said, ever well informed. Arya coughed violently. Sansa’s smile tightened. He amended, “Or mice infestations.”

Catelyn pursed her lips, “Yes, well, I’ll just leave it here then.” She placed it on the table at Sansa’s bedside.

“Would you like to stay?” Sansa offered, “Arya has brought a whole,” she struggled to find an inviting word to describe the stained cheesecloth bundle of apples and peaches and pears that Arya had unfurled upon her entrance, that now lay scattered on her sewing table, “ _cornucopia_ of fruits.”

“No, I should have been abed far earlier than now,” Catelyn bobbed her head slightly and then seemingly unable to help herself, her tone a shade of what it used to be, “Though, Arya, it is not wise to eat so much fruit before bed. You’ll have night terrors.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, Mother,” Arya said, “Good night.”

“Yes, good night, Mother,” Sansa said.

Catelyn turned to leave but something caught her eye, “Arya, do you plan on leaving that mess on your sister’s floor?”

Arya looked dumbly down at the pile that had accumulated at her feet, “No.”

“I should hope not, good night.”

She left, the door knocking as it closed behind her.

\--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sansa has finally had the eternally embarrassing moment of your mom finding a hickey! ;) Proud of her.   
> Also, totally stole Varys' lines from 1998's Elizabeth. Not even sorry. :D
> 
> Thank you for the lovely comments! :) Hope you enjoy! I tried to get this out a bit early because I have gone back to work this week. :O Forgive me if I am delayed in moderating/answering everyone!


	14. is it snowing in london and warm in your bed

_(A memory: Old Nan sits rocking, knitting, the children gathered at her feet. Robb, bouncing on his knees, Theon, sprawled out, pretending not to listen, Jon, dark and quiet even as a child, Arya, never still, rolling about on the floor, letting Bran straddle her back, like she was a horse, and Sansa, sitting straight in a chair with baby Rickon babbling in her lap._

_“The Kings of Winter,” Old Nan says, “were chosen by their lords and then brought before the Great Stone. When they pressed their hands to it, it would roar and that’s how they would know that he was the rightful ruler.”_

_“The rock roared?” Arya asked, skeptically. Bran roared, scared himself, and tumbled off her back with the force of his giggles._

_“Yes, it roared, and the sound filled the forests! When it was done, the Kings were wed to the land—”_

_Sansa scowled, “That’s not very romantic.”_

_Robb said, “Yes, it is! It means that you don’t have a stupid wife to tell you what to do and that you only care about fighting for the North.” He made a parry in the air; Theon kicked his arm out of the way._

_Sansa sniffed, “Well, Father married Mother, he didn’t need to wed the land to be a good Northerner.”_

_Robb rolled his eyes, “Well, Father’s not a king, you ninny.”_

_“Don’t call her that!” Arya said, “Only I get to call her that!”_

_Old Nan said sagely, “Let me tell you about the Children of the Forest, come to me, Bran, you might like this one.”)_

\--

Once Catelyn left, it took little time for Arya to take her leave as well, though she did not pick up her fruit. Tyrion gathered them up, rewrapping them, now browned and sickly-sweet, in the cheesecloth. When he was done, Sansa reached for him and he went to stand between her knees. With her sitting and him standing, they were almost exactly at eye level. He passed his thumb across the bridge of her cheekbone.

“I don’t want to talk about it, any of it,” she murmured, “I just want to rest.”

Tyrion nodded.

“Stay with me,” she said and took Tyrion’s hand and led him to bed.

They did not often sleep together, too risky by half, but when they did, they slept curled toward each other, faces inches apart.

_(She has always hated her body—the way it made men look, the way it made them speak about her and to her, made them feel like they could ask for kisses and songs even as their world burned and as her home laid trampled in the snow—she hated it more after Ramsay was done with it, how hideous it looked, like it did not belong to her anymore. She had nearly wept the first time Tyrion saw her naked, but he had been gentleness incarnate, running his nails along the puckered marks on her back._

_She told him once: “I was beautiful.”_

_She could see the sorrow rip across his face like she had struck him and she realized: he knows what it’s like to hate the shape you were born into, the way that it gave others admission to look and speak and feel.)_

As Sansa pulled the bed sheets over them, she said, “I can never sleep anymore.”

_(She never has been able to. He remembers her restlessness in their shared chambers in the Red Keep, watching her toss and turn from his settee.)_

His hands stroke down her sides, “Let me help you relax.”

His voice sends tremors down her spine. After a moment, she nodded, and his hands brushed down to hold her mound. Her whole body felt so heavy, her weight concentrated achingly where his hand was. He reached under her nightgown and began to massage right at her nub. Slow spread of warmth. Her hands went to his shoulder, leg swung over his hip, fingers scrabbled to sink into his nape. The sharpness made him grunt.

_(He is so good at this, she thinks wildly, as her hips snap towards him. Of all the tricks he’s showed her, all the way he’s arranged their bodies for their pleasure, all the things he has demonstrated sex can be, it’s still this, the simple act of him touching her there that makes her heart swell and her body heat with the most sweetness. It’s so intimate, his eyes on hers, breaths mingling, him sipping at her whimpers, “Let me help you relax,” he’s said it before, and it always means this: comfort.)_

She panted his name, “Oh Gods, Tyrion.”

He hushed her.

_(Even that is soft. It’s all soft here, their bodies curled like two reverent question marks.)_

She palmed at his chest, feeling for the thud of his pulse and his heart, and she let him hold her hip, his unoccupied hand clasping her at the tender juncture of her hip and belly. Two fingers dipped into her and that was when she hid her face in his neck.

_(Even the scratch of his beard feels like affection.)_

She rolled her hips toward him again, but he only held her firmer.

_(It is his deft steadiness, she thinks, as he strokes her. It is like a heartbeat itself. No matter how she surges or writhes, it’s always there, gentle and wanting. He would forgive her anything, she thinks wildly, as she nips at his ear, the swell of power makes her sick, but she moves her leg further up to settle at his waist anyway. She would forgive him anything, too, she decides drunkenly, because he is just so kind.)_

There was a quick moment of tension when she goes taut. Then she peaked with a silent sigh.

_(It comes in waves, ripples, rivulets, joy streams out of her, she kisses him.)_

She felt heavy again, but it is a boneless, relieved force that presses her deep into the mattress and blankets. Her skin glowed with energy, sensitive to everything, the heat radiating from his hand at her hip, the stretch of his fingers still inside of her, the cooling of her core, the texture of her nightgown, the weight of their quilt.

_(The first time they had sex what she noticed the most was that she could close the distance between her and her body. She kisses him again because it is what she wants.)_

She could sense how drunken and sleepy her expression must look though Tyrion waited until she was focused enough to watch him slip his hand from within her to lave at his slick index. She craned forward at the sight, and he gave her his middle finger, touching her mouth and pushing it past her teeth as if he was feeding her the greatest delicacy in the world. Her cheeks hollowed slightly as she sucked the salt from his fingertips. When she was done, he drew his fingers down her throat, necklacing her with touches.

_(It’s a mad thought but: he told her once that they were perfect for each other and she had laughed but maybe he was right. Maybe those like them who have hated like they have and known ugliness like they have can truly desire the other. That the things that others have snipped away from them is what has shaped them to be able to fit together as they do. That is a terribly sad thought, she knows he would tell her, so she keeps it locked away.)_

“Do you need—”she started, eyelids already drooping.

“No, darling, sleep now.”

_(She is always so tired, so restless, has to move and go and be in motion all the time. Her kingdom demands it, she demands it—but Tyrion has always, always, always, since before they were married, just wanted her to be able to rest.)_

She did, rolling to her stomach, allowing him to skim his hand down from the crown of her hair to the small of her back. It soothed her and she felt herself drifting to sleep.

_(This is something she cannot ruin. Even if she tried.)_

\--

It was the pain in his hips that woke him before daylight.

_(It’s always something. Hips, back, legs, even his toes, like his skeleton is just so tired of hauling his body around.)_

His first thought was that he needed to leave. But Sansa was still intertwined with him and he did not want to wake her. She murmured sleepily as he moved away from her, shifted without really waking, sighing, “Come back to bed, sweetheart. It’s cold.”

He smiled because since when has Sansa ever complained about the cold? Then he shushed her, and she settled.

_(“Let me help you relax,” the first time he says it, he intends it as seduction. The other times, the other times he means it. Let me help you. Let me help. Let me.)_

\--

Sansa awoke later than usual. It felt delicious and indulgent like the first bite of a second lemon cake.

Then she remembered: Jon arrived tomorrow.

She sleepwalked through petitions, her ear half-attending, her mouth moving of its own volition, her mind rattling off tax codes and weight specifications for lumber. Council had been cancelled for the afternoon in deference to the final preparations for Jon’s visit and so after meeting with Jeyne about rooms, and Lord Manderley about wildling trade, and Lord Glover about both her brothers, she relished in being able to close her solar door.

She worked steadily for almost two hours. Just as she was about to put down her pen and seek out the kitchens for the scraps of the midday meal, Lady Flint knocked and entered.

Sansa had first noticed Lady Flint at her coronation. She was a striking woman—iron grey hair, always coiled neatly on the top of her head, clear blue eyes, and a prominent hawkish nose. She had spoken at the first general meeting of the freed Northern houses, hushing Lord Manderley’s long-winded explanation of the cost of agricultural renewal with a crisp, “I think you are mistaken, my Lord.” She had been offered a council seat the next day.

She reminded Sansa mildly of Lady Olenna—direct and unflappable. Her husband was a pleasant sort as well. He had happily spent the last twenty-five years of their marriage hawking and reading, leaving his wife to tend to demands of their estate. Sansa had spent many pleasant evening supping with them in their chambers and getting to know their five children. However, today, Lady Flint looked less than hospitable.

Without greeting, she began, “Your Grace, I am growing increasingly concerned about Prince Robb’s claim to the throne.”

_(“Ahead of schedule,” Petyr commented.)_

Sansa sat back in her chair, raising her eyebrows in feigned surprise, “What specifically?”

“He is not suited for the role.” Lady Flint took a seat at the solar table, “I have had several complaints from the Tallharts about mistakes made to their tithing requests. Some other merchants have told the same to Lord Manderley, though he has brushed all of those off, naturally.” She rolled her eyes.

“Robb has been away for a very long time—”

“There is, of course, also the manner of his leaving. He owes restitution to the Hornwoods, to our house, and to many others besides.”

Sansa nodded, “I agree. I will speak to him about it.”

“Your Grace, forgive me, but you may fool Glover and Manderley and your family, but I know you better than that. You are not pleased that he has made the claim.”

Sansa felt her mask fall away and took a deep clean breath, her first in several days, “No, I am not but I made a promise to my sister to not disturb our house and I have no wish to depose a brother who I just regained.”

Lady Flint smirked, she held Sansa’s hand, “So what’s your real plan?”

Sansa met her eyes and smiled back. She explained her proposal. Lady Flint sat back and listened, “It’s unprecedented,” she sucked her lips, a nervous habit, “Though, I suppose having a queen is, as well.” She shrugged, “It’s clever, as well, _risky_ , though. Honestly, I’m surprised Glover knew that much about inheritance law to be able to pull that out,” she considered Sansa for a long moment, eyes eagle-sharp, “If we start lobbying in earnest now, we might just do it.”

“Lord Glover is already working on it.”

Lady Flint shook her head condescendingly, “Your Grace, forgive me, but you might want a gentler touch than old Glover.”

Sansa grinned, “So I can count on your support then?”

Lady Flint laughed, “Of course, my dear,” she grew serious, “The biggest concern will be heirs. Unfortunately, your brother has the means of making already in place and you have shown little inclination to even entertain the idea of a husband.”

“I have considered that. I will put Robb’s children in place as my candidates for rule after I die.”

Lady Flint shrugged doubtfully, “It might work but we will try to make sure the people focus on you, their heroine, their Maiden incarnate. I would be aware of Manderley, he’s still got pull with the coastal families and he would follow anything with a cock.”

They conversed for a few more moments before Lady Flint took her leave. As she made her way to leave, she sighed, “I am sorry for it, but the Prince is simply too human for the crown.”

_(An interesting thought. “There’s nothing more powerful than a good story. Nothing can stop it. No enemy can defeat it,” Tyrion echoes in her ear. The final piece locks into place.)_

\--

She slept alone that night. Well, she did not sleep, actually, energy renewed by her conversation with Lady Flint.

She read for a bit, pulled from her shelf a battered copy of The Book of the Seven.

_(“Where have you rebuilt the sept?” Catelyn asks, the second day that she comes to brush her hair._

_“We didn’t rebuild it. We follow old ways now, no more Southern Gods.”_

_Catelyn’s face pinched. But she said nothing.)_

She searched through the Hymns of the Maiden and found the illumination, her favorite as a child, its chipped gilt edging still glinting dully in the candlelight, the Maiden still serene even through the scars of the flecked away pigment.

She summoned Jeyne, “Do you know where the shipments of Lysene silks were brought?”

Jeyne brought them to her, bolts of jewel-toned cloth. Lysene silk was always a dream to work with, like woven water, and she had charmed him so much that the ambassador always ensured that she was well-supplied with every color imaginable: plum, apricot, sienna, rose, emerald, and—

“This one,” she said. A bolt of iridescent pearl.

“Are you making a new gown?” Jeyne asked. She, like Sansa, had retained her love of gowns and pretty things.

Sansa’s mouth twisted into a smile, “Yes. Yes, I am. And I will need your help.”

\--

The announcement of Jon’s arrival was heralded through the halls. They all gathered in the courtyard: Robb bouncing anxiously on the balls of his feet, only matched by Arya, who was driving Sansa mad with her nervous energy. Catelyn was stoic and Talisa hovered by her. Her counsel stood, dignified, Jeyne was busy moving, ensuring that the servants were at the ready to except the influx of humanity. Tyrion stood a little apart.

_(He was nervous, she knew, thought that Jon had never forgiven him for Daenerys’s death. She has always thought that their distance was unnecessary, borne from their own guilt. She wonders if there’s something wrong with her that she does not share it.)_

Jon had brought his whole retinue. The Free Folk had no flag, no sigil but nonetheless were unmistakable, clothed in the furs of the strange white bears that lumbered beyond the Wall. They streamed into the courtyard, a cacophonous river of clattering horses and roughly accented shouts. At the head loped Ghost, somehow even bigger than Sansa remembered and just behind him: Jon Snow.

Jon sat astride his war horse, still dressed in the black of the Night’s Watch.

_(The Crow King, they called him, brother to the Southern Raven. To her people, she was the Ice Maiden, to the Free Folk, the Red Wolf. Arya was not the Bringer of the Dawn or Azor Azhai to them either, but the Knife of the Night, and Tyrion, called Kingmaker in the South, had no name.)_

There was little to distinguish him from the others, no crown, except that one had always been able to recognize Jon in a crowd. Tormund Giantsbane rode beside him, waved excitedly at the sight of Arya and Tyrion, who he had not seen in five years or more. Sansa could practically feel her mother wilt beside her with the impropriety.

Arya could not wait any longer, launching herself towards Jon before he even had a chance to dismount. They leapt at each other, embracing, and Jon swung Arya about as if she was a child. Catelyn’s mouth pinched. Half-carrying Arya, he made his way to their grouping. Robb moved first, of course.

_(They looked like shadows of the other. Undeniably brothers. Their faces the same nose, same jaw, same curl to their hair. But Robb still had that sunny southern rust coloring his features and Jon was all wintered contrasts, white skin, black hair. They had the same eyes of all of Ned’s children: Stark grey.)_

Robb and Jon wrapped their arms about each other, pressed together, faces tucked into each other’s shoulders. They parted, holding each other’s mirrored faces, touching to see if the other were real, eyes shining.

_(Her earliest memory is being tossed between the two of them. They were not that far apart in age, but both had always seemed so much bigger than her. They had raced with her down the halls, pulling her by the arms so that she flew for a few moments in the air before landing squarely on the ground. They were laughing hysterically, slumped on the floor, she thought they were just the best two things in the world.)_

They came together again. Sansa blinked rapidly to stop the tears and Arya grasped her hand, leaned into her.

_(All of them had lived, all but Rickon. He was still only three in her head.)_

When they parted again, their arms stayed slung about each other and when they approached Sansa, they gathered her up together. They crushed her between them, each of her arms about each of their necks, their arms linked about her back. She laughed at the tickle of Jon’s new beard on her wet cheek, beamed at their twin kisses to her temples, stretched her toes because no matter how tall she was, Robb was still that inch above her.

The embrace broke and Robb brought Talisa forward and Jon bent to kiss her hand. Then, Jon approached Catelyn. She offered a hand and he bent to kiss it. It would look gallant, like a chivalric tableau from a song, if it were anyone else.

_(Her second memory: Her mother finding her, one afternoon, with Jon and Robb in the library, her arms ringed around Jon’s neck as he read, clutching a doll, thumb in her mouth, haltingly, whatever silly story she demanded of him. Her mother sits her down and explains that it is just not appropriate for her to play with Jon like that. He is a bastard, half of what she and Robb and Arya and Bran and the baby in her belly are, it is a kindness for them to let him stay with them at all. Sansa nods and Catelyn pats her head, “Good girl.”)_

He clasped hands with Tyrion and the members of her council one by one. Once the pleasantries were done, Robb called, “Shall we go in? We have much to discuss, my brother and I!”

Tormund had joined them at this point, clapped Tyrion so hard on the back that he stumbled, and shouted in agreement, “Lord Tyrion, to the wine cellar!”

Arms about each other, Robb and Jon led the way inside.

_(There’s a gap between them, she can see it, negative space, where Theon should be.)_

Arya came beside her, locked together their arms, smiling, and they processed inside.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like this chapter is like a sampler platter of everything in this fic: an AU flashback, angsty smut, political plotting, and then Jon!!! I just love Jon so much. ...and yes, the chapter title was chosen for the snow pun. 
> 
> The story Old Nan tells is based on the Irish coronation legend of Lia Fail. Lia Fail is a magical stone that is was said to roar when the rightful king put his feet on it. The Irish Kings of the Iron Age were also likely to have engaged in a marriage ceremony with the land. That did not prevent them from having consorts and children but it was a unique way of demonstrating sovereignty. Felt tres Stark to me. 
> 
> DONT READ IF EASILY DISGUSTED BUT I HAVE TO SHARE BECAUSE ITS TOO GROSS TO KEEP TO MYSELF. More fun facts from your friendly fanfic-writing archaeologist is that the famous "bog bodies" found in Ireland were likely related to this tradition. If the land failed (i.e. significant period of drought, etc.) it must mean that the land was asking for a divorce. There is a curious pattern amongst the bog bodies of them being killed in similar ways...particularly with their nipples being cut off and frequently containing copious amounts of alcohol and drugs in their stomach contents. Another legend is that in ancient Ireland, instead of kissing the ring of a king to show respect, you would instead kiss the source of life: the nipple. This pattern gives credence to that dubious oral tradition. When it was perceived by your people that the land was rejecting you as king, there would be a celebration of some kind where the king would be intentionally drugged and then killed and mutilated in this specific way so he could not be sovereign even in the afterlife. The body would then be thrown in the bog where, unbeknownst to the killers, it was mummified by the unbelievable pH imbalance of the bogs and then found centuries later by peat farmers. I mean, Robb's nipples will remain intact. But still. The Iron Age was WILD and I wanted to share. END OF GROSS TANGENTIAL STORYTIME. 
> 
> Thanks for all your lovely comments! :) Hope you enjoy! <3


	15. you know limbless they marched till they fell off the map

_(Jon is wrong about a lot when it comes to the Dragon Queen. The first is that Sansa was unkind to her from the moment the Southern army arrived. She had remembered her courtesies when she had first arrived. Taken in her violet eyes, white hair, the dragons. She greeted her attendants: Tyrion, Varys, Ser Jorah, Missandei, Grey Worm. She had led her to her chambers herself, had baths readied, even congratulated her on the capture of King’s Landing. But she had noted how the Queen’s strange eyes tracked Jon and it reminded her of something.)_

_\--_

The whole party ate the midday meal together. Platters of soft goat’s cheese and thin sliced bread, bowls of spring greens topped with strawberries, roasted chickens stuffed with preserved southern lemons, dishes of honeyed almonds, pitchers of ale and spiced wine dotted the tables.

The Starks all sat together at the high table. Robb, next to Talisa, Sansa, next to Jon, and Arya jammed next to Catelyn. He sat with Tormund whose obsession with Brienne had not abated. But even as the wildling badgered him about ‘the big woman’, he managed to catch Jon’s eye. He nodded toward him in acknowledgement, Jon caught it, then looked away.

\--

_(_ _The animosity started when they began to have meetings to strategize about the battle. Daenerys is fire and blood; Sansa is paper and pen._

_There’s something of Aunt Lysa in her, the flair for the dramatic, the way she relies on Tyrion and Missandei to deal with the details of her choices, the obsession with her children._

_She pictures Lysa with a dragon and shudders.)_

\--

After the meal was finished, their new guests began to drift towards their quarters. Robb was wrapped up in conversation with Jon. Catelyn stood to the side, watching them, unreadable. Talisa stood to the side, speaking with but not saying anything to Arya. Sansa approached, touched Jon on the arm, and Jon broke off from Robb. Sansa said something that only Jon could hear. Then they excused themselves and left. Catelyn watched after them, frowning. Robb made to follow but Tyrion stopped him with a touch to the elbow.

“Let them go,” Tyrion said quietly. Robb glanced down at him. Tyrion patted his arm, “There is no place for us there.”

\--

_(The Long Night happens. They are a little broken after it, she thinks, and a little too high on having done the impossible as well. They are all legends now. Maybe that is what makes her eyes flash the way they do. Daenerys Stormborn, who faced Death and lived, roaring on the back of the first dragon in one hundred years. It would be heady for any person._

_Or she’s just already mad.)_

\--

Sansa leaned against Jon as they slumped against the base of Lyanna’s memorial. It had miraculously survived the Battle of Winterfell; the only evidence of damage was a slight chip on her nose. Jon leaned back to take a drag of the wine they had taken with them, his curls brushing against his mother’s stone feet.

“What would you do, if your mother came back?” Sansa asked.

Jon shrugged, “I’d be happy, I suppose,” he seemed to think about it longer, “I think she would understand because of Rhaegar—”

_(He never calls him Father.)_

“—what happened during the war—”

_(He can’t bear to call it what it is: betrayal.)_

Sansa nodded, “If you asked me before, I would have thought so, too.”

Jon looked at her, “Well, my mother isn’t hiding in Volantis.”

_(In another’s mouth, the voice would be accusatory. Jon’s too good for that, though.)_

“He wants to be king,” her voice was soft, scared, it ricocheted off the stone ceilings.

Jon laughed, took another sip of wine, “Of course he does.”

_(Her habit is to remember the childhood things that are soaked in gold and laughter and love. But for every memory there is of Jon and Robb and Theon sparring, joking, mucking up trouble for themselves, there is another for Robb being processed in first for a feast, Robb escaping blame if not punishment for a prank, Robb’s name-day marked with colorful packages and sweet buns and vassals kissing his hand. It had all been so natural that, in those other memories, she cannot even find Jon.)_

A beat. “Do they know about Tyrion?”

She swirled the dregs of her wine in her cup, “Robb and Talisa, no, and I will keep it that way until I cannot anymore. Mother found a love mark on my—” she pointed to her breast.

Jon threw back his head and laughed, “Now you know what it’s like!”

_(He’s talking about Theon now, really. He had never been up the serving girls’ skirts or to the whorehouse in the village. Had not saved him from a thrashing when Catelyn had discovered a ring of kisses about Theon’s throat.)_

“She was surprisingly calm about it but I just—” she was blushing, she could tell, she covered her face.

_(He’s laughing and she bubbles with joy. It is even rarer than Tyrion’s and she is seized by the urge to squeeze him in gratitude.)_

She punched him slightly then laid her head against his shoulder and he leaned against it, “You look well,” she said, “Better than you did last time.”

“Spring has been good to us.”

“And Jarl?”

He laughed slightly, “And Jarl is good to me, too.”

_(Jarl is as far from Daenerys as one could get in one person. Tall, open, gregarious, ruddy. He is a good man. An easy man to love, she thinks, uncomplicated and steady. Gods knows Jon is complicated and unsteady enough for the two of them.)_

“Good,” she pressed a kiss to his temple.

_(She knows love now, and cruelty, and what people deserve. And Jon deserves this. More than anyone.)_

Eventually the conversation between them dwindled to them sharing sips of wine.

“We should go,” Jon said finally. They stood, brushing the dust from their legs.

“You should talk with Tyrion,” she said it casually as she gathered the cups and wine jug.

Sullenness crowded his features, and she touched his arm, “For me, Jon. You were friends once.”

Jon nodded and Sansa started to leave. Jon ran his fingers along the edge of Lyanna’s statue and followed her up the steps.

\--

_(She had been considering all these things: the stories of Daenerys’ Eastern exploits, the way Jon has seemed to have lost himself in the spell of her, the way she sometimes snaps and pops like a shifting hearth log._

_She sees one day from the ramparts, Drogon, flying overhead. It is an awesome sight, his wings pumping, the knot of sinew that connects wing to body pulsing with energy, reptilian eyes aglow. She sweeps her gaze across the horizon, the distant forest, its borders charred beyond recognition, the grass crisped away, the tumble of stone where there had been structures and now lay the corpses of buildings. No person should have that power. Especially not one with a temper like that._

_When Bran tells them, Jon standing, ashamed, in the snow under the weirwood, the truth about himself, it feels like relief._

_It’s also the first time she sees Petyr, fully corporeal, leaning against the weirwood tree. He winks at her and she knows what to do.)_

\--

Jon and Robb were drunk. That much was clear. Not slurring their words, not boisterous, but that blessed middle bit where the exterior world has faded to black and everything was a bit dulled, a bit misty—

 _(He misses that. By the Gods, he misses it. He misses dulling the edge of it all, everything is so_ sharp _these days. But in the North, even as the others slosh with wine and liquors and thick beers, mysteriously when he searches for refreshment there is only weak ale, milk, tea, water infused with herbs. He is sick to death of tea.)_

Sansa had found him after she emerged from the crypts, sitting in front of the Great Hall’s magnificent hearth, chewing the stem of his pipe.

_(That’s a new habit, only two years old, one she forgets he has until she smells the smoke in hair or tastes it on his lips. One she hates when she remembers. It’s not drink, though, and it’s not whores._

_She endures it.)_

They sat for a while, Sansa sipping a steaming cup of tea and Tyrion puffing out white smoky ringlets. They talked of a certain ambassador from Pentos, familiar to both of them, who had scandalized the continent by running away with a Lysene noblewoman and the news that Mereen was under yet another new leader. He was leaning over to whisper something filthy in her ear when—

“Sansa!” Robb and Jon tripped into the room. Jug of wine dangled between them. They looked like boys, jostling each other slightly.

“What are you two doing here?” Robb asked, collapsing next on a bench near them. It was the opposite of kingly and Tyrion thought that maybe it was what made it so charming. Jon sat next to him. Always the staider one.

“Jon,” Robb continued, “has been telling me all about White Walkers. By the Seven, Sansa. They stole _babies_.”

_(Robb, Tyrion realizes suddenly, is the only parent among them.)_

Sansa hummed in agreement. She sipped her tea and Robb sat up suddenly, “What are you drinking? It smells _foul._ ”

“Tea.”

“Let me taste,” he said eagerly, it reminded him of Jaime.

There was a ghost of a smirk on Sansa’s face and she handed the cup to him.

_(It’s the moon tea that Jeyne discreetly brews for her, he can tell by the smell and the color, is amused that Robb does not even bat an eye in recognition when he sips. Stark men, he shakes his head to himself. So noble, brave, and true that he cannot even taste that she is giving him her greatest secret in a painted teacup.)_

“Sansa, _that_ is disgusting.”

“It’s supposed to clear the skin,” Sansa said, and Tyrion has to jam the clay pipe between his teeth to keep from reacting.

“You would do anything for beauty, Sans.”

Jon stiffened, on guard.

_(Because it would hurt her to hear that? Because it is true? He is not ignorant to her behavior as a child. He had been wed to her then after all, heard Shae’s complaints about how long it took her to do Sansa’s hair. Knew even now the care she took in maintaining her gowns, watched her just the evening before wash her face, oil her hands and feet._

_“I was beautiful,” she had said. Was? He stared at her confounded. What did that even mean?)_

But Sansa did not react, merely took the teacup back and blew at the steam. Robb launched into an amusing anecdote about when Sansa and Jeyne decided to try a beauty treatment that involved horse dung.

Conversation drifts from this to that. Jon told him tales of the Night’s Watch—good and noble Sam, dignified Lord Commander Mormont, Dolorous Ed, even Mance and Thorne. Nothing of his disastrous attempts at loving Ygritte, at loving Dany.

They had had nights like this when Jon came to Dragonstone, even on the way to the North, after Jon and Dany were in love, after Jaime had joined them, steaming from their victory over his sister. Sat up all night. Jon was funny in the way that Sansa was funny, in the way Bran was funny, not always realizing it. Could not tell a jape but so dry that their words would crackle. He was looking for Jon for a drink when he became suspicious that the simmering tensions between Dany and Jon had boiled over into love.

_(It had reminded him of his childhood, tracing the halls of Casterly Rock, pattering to and away from Joanna’s grave, and hearing in corners and alcoves, Jaime and Cersei’s secret sounds.)_

Talk turned to the Long Night and Tyrion realized that whether by intention or lack of time Sansa had never followed up on her history lesson with Robb, never completed the telling of the tale. Robb had heard stories, of course, realized by now that Arya’s childhood interest in combat had progressed to something more, knew that the glass gardens and stables and walls looked newer, but—

“Shit,” Robb breathed as Jon described rolling Bran out for bait, the roar of dragons, the heat of the fire trenches—

_(Tyrion’s memories are slightly different. The tension, the distant lull of battle, and Sansa. All of Sansa._

_“You were the best of them.”_

_The terror, the finality in her eyes, her hand in his, trembling, the knife pointed to the tender arch of her ribcage, kissing her hand:_ I’ll stay with you. Stay with me. Whatever happens, just stay. _)_

_(Tyrion can see the longing in Robb’s eyes. He knows it. He felt it that night. It must be worse for him, Tyrion thinks, Robb was a fighter above all else. A warrior who missed a battle that would be sung into myth, a battle where one would be touched with glory simply by the fact that they were there.)_

Then they get to Theon. How he charged the Night King, was slaughtered.

_(He had not cried, had not the energy, even when he saw Varys, his dearest friend, alive, or Jorah Mormont’s body, cut to ribbons, or the carnage, the mountain range of bodies, the arrows sticking out of the earth like pins. Sansa, though, when she saw Theon’s body had cried out. Had knelt over his body, foreheads pressed together. Had to be led away by Jon and Arya and Brienne. It was a blinding fissure in her shield of ice.)_

And Robb said: “Well, he _was_ a traitor.”

Tyrion and Jon sucked in an identical breath, looked to Sansa. She sipped her tea. In the cool shadows of the night, her eyes look like Bran’s.

“He was a hero,” she said. Took another drink of her tea, now cold.

Robb sat up, “He broke his sacred oath to me. Betrayed his king, executed Rodrik Cassel. He took Winterfell and killed children to do it. Then, perhaps, worse he lost it to what turned out to be our greatest enemies. The people who worked with Lannisters to slaughter me and Mother.”

His family name was dipped in contempt. He puffed his pipe.

“And he regretted it. Paid for it, even, most dearly.”

“He betrayed me. Turned his father against me.”

“If I remember, his father was always against you, which is why we knew Theon in the first place.”

_(When Sansa argues a point, it is always crisp and neat. Nothing spills over the edge.)_

“Sansa—”

“He saved my life, Robb, cared for me. That’s more than you ever did.”

_(Until now.)_

Robb’s face drained of color; took him more than a few moments to respond: “Sansa, I am—”

“I am going to bed,” she announced abruptly, gathered her skirts, and left, the gentle padding of her slippers echoing, the swing and slam of Great Hall doors deafening.

Tyrion, Jon, and Robb were left in silence.

“Shall you go, or shall I?” It was Jon, quiet, unsubtle, directed to Tyrion. Tyrion resisted the urge to roll his eyes, _Robb is still only three hands away from you._ But Robb seemed to take no notice, staring past them at the door.

Tyrion shook his head, clamped his pipe between his lips, the hot clay seared, “Not tonight.”

_(There’s no space for him when it comes to Theon. No space for him, for any of them, when it comes to anything that has to do with the Boltons. Just as there’s no space for her when he remembers Tysha’s terrified shrieks or shudders at the clinking of coins. Just as he is sure there is not space for any of them when Robb thinks about his child or the Twins.)_

Silence fell again.

_(Jon has another name besides the Crow King. It is the Peacemaker, the Wall Breaker.)_

“She’s been through a lot, Robb, it was not easy for her. Any of it. She was all alone, for years, without us. Any of us. She had to learn how to survive completely on her own. When I first saw her after she escaped the Boltons,” he whistled lowly, “She has endured unspeakable things and it has come at a terrible cost.”

Robb said, “I know she has suffered, and I know she must be angry. I am sorry for it. The Seven _knows_ I am. I so regret everything that has happened. But to forgive the man that tried to kill our brothers, would have killed them if he could have, who took our home.” He shook his head, “She is not the only one who has suffered.”

“I know,” Jon said, “We all have, Robb, in our own ways.”

_(Jon and Robb were more than just facsimile faces, weren’t they? Tyrion had heard what happened to the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch. Ran away with a wildling girl. Stabbed by his own brothers. Never the same after that, they said. He wonders if he has told Robb.)_

Robb clasped Jon’s hand, “Yes, brother, we have.”

 _(It strikes Tyrion. Robb doesn’t_ know. _He doesn’t know about Jon. The epiphany beats against Tyrion’s chest like a caged bird’s wings. But no one else seems to notice.)_

“I will speak with her on the morrow,” Robb said, “I must go to bed now, I’m sure Talisa’s wondering where I’ve gone. Lord Tyrion, are we still meeting after the midday meal?”

“Of course.”

And then he and Jon were alone.

\--

_(When she speaks to Tyrion about Jon’s secret, she really only means to plant a seed of doubt in him, to give him an option. Let him do the rest. She doesn’t realize that she would be just watering what has already been growing in his mind for weeks. She doesn’t expect him to pull her into his chambers, ask her reasons, to listen. She tells him to speak to Jon, to Varys._

_She already has.)_

\--

“Sansa wants us to talk,” It was Jon first.

“About what?”

“She wants her men in agreement, I think,” Jon said. It is such a wildling way to phrase it that Tyrion has to quirk an eyebrow.

“I did not realize we were in disagreement.”

“She thinks that because of Dany—”

“I know what she thinks about _that.”_

“Yes, well.”

Tyrion stared at Jon, how royal he looked still, even slightly giddy on too much mulled wine, even out of his Night’s Watch uniform. A pity.

“I don’t have much to say for once. I convinced you to join a rebellion that you did not want to join. I tried to make you king. You refused. You went beyond the wall and became king anyway. Not much to say,” Tyrion shrugged.

“Sansa thinks I am angry with you.”

Tyrion lowered his voice to a husky stage whisper, “Lord Snow, if you’re not, you probably should be.”

“I’m not.”

“Of course not,” Tyrion sighed. He wished someone were. Would take the burden off himself a bit, “I loved her, too. Differently than you, of course, but she was a wonderful woman.”

“So is Sansa.” Jon said.

“Not the same, though,” and Jon nodded in agreement. Tyrion shifted, the pipe smoke is making him nauseous and light-headed, and the words tumbled out of him, “I know what it’s like, to kill someone that you loved.”

Jon reached a hand out, placed it on Tyrion’s knee, “I know. I’ve heard.”

_(What a terrible fraternity to be in. But a fraternity nonetheless.)_

_\--_

_(Varys writes to her to tell her what happened, the yield of what she has sown._

_The journey to King’s Landing is what broke Daenerys, Varys says, the weight of her losses, the fear of the smallfolk, no awe to be found. It is slow, her madness, each move logical in its own way, so much like her father. Reading Tyrion and Jon’s correspondence. Executing two men for whispering. Then two more. Then six. Her terror at losing Jon, like Jorah, had him trapped in his tent and in her litter. By the time they reached King’s Landing, even Greyworm and Missandei were wary of her._

_Their plan to poison her on the road was thwarted by the installation of tasters. Sansa’s packet of powdered hemlock root, lifted from Arya, gifted to Varys, tossed into the river._

_That night, a raven flies North. Another returns._

_When they arrived in the city, Daenerys threw Jaime Lannister into his sister’s cell. Executed the remnants of Cersei’s servants and a few others besides. Mock trial, Brienne in distress, twins dead by morning._

_Tyrion thrown to the dungeons shortly after for daring to weep at the sight of his brother and sister, embraced, Jaime’s hands on her throat, his own knife clutched in Cersei’s hand, blooming blood across his belly._

_Where had the knife come from, it was wondered. No one knew._

_The morning after, Jon goes to Tyrion with a message from the Queen. Death warrant, some say, no, a pardon, corrects someone else. He emerged, solemn-faced, stroked Daenerys’s hair, kissed her mouth, and told her not to worry about the Imp’s treachery. That evening, Jon Snow approached her on her throne. Embraced her. Slotted Jaime’s knife through her ribs. Her dragons gathered her up in their claws and flew away, burning a gash down the center of the South, until their terror was mere specks on the horizon. Almost all went to plan except when the court arose the next morning to find their new queen dead, there was no King Jon to replace her._

_Instead they break the wheel._

_Instead it is decided that they must hold an election._

_Instead they choose Bran.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this house, we lean into Jon Snow's overwhelming disaster!bi energy. ;D
> 
> Also part 4579 of my TEDTalk on S8: 
> 
> -Cersei/Jaime should have killed each other.   
> -Daenerys should have descended slowly, agonizingly, into madness (I mean, I understand it's like 2 sentences here but still.)   
> -Sansa had legit reasons to mistrust Dany beyond like...idk...the fact that she was ALSO a woman? And she's not stupid enough to show it. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy! :)


	16. calloused pride come to die in our hands as we touch

The morning began, for Sansa, with Robb approaching her after petitions.

_(It is too much to see him approach. Too much. She absolutely cannot_ do _this right now.)_

“Sansa, I did not mean to upset you last night, truly—” He walked with her down the hall. _(It feels like she’s running away.)_

“It’s fine, Robb.” _(It’s not.)_

“Sansa, I know you have been through a lot—”

_(Mother’s hands passing over her scars had felt gentle. She had_ wept. _Sansa had never seen her mother cry. And she can’t do this right now, it’s like drowning—)_

“Really, Robb, I am alright. All is forgiven.”

_(Well, not all, not even close, but she has another meeting in just a few moments and she cannot do this right now.)_

\--

He tried again during the middle of the day as they moved Robb and Talisa and Catelyn into rooms in the family wing. But she waved him away, spoke to her mother and Talisa about any further furnishings, sent Jeyne to follow up. She could feel her brother’s eyes on her as she hurried away.

\--

Tyrion met with Robb again.

_(He recognizes that it is the same servant who brought them refreshment last time. Sees the confusion on Robb’s face as to why he was brought ale when he ordered for wine.)_

Robb’s plans were good, mutually beneficial, refreshingly standard.

_(Sansa’s plans always contain some sort of dreadful surprise. His first two years of negotiations have left him with a habit of reading her contracts several times, sometimes aloud. It is the part of her that was reared by Baelish, the part that rarely makes its way out of her solar—the part that hides the fate of men in the placement of a comma.)_

Robb wanted the increased border defenses—

_(Not an issue unless Bran decided to wage war against his brother. Tyrion thought about it. Unlikely, he decided.)_

\--and he wanted ease Sansa’s extremely high lumber prices in exchange for a return to the previous arrangement, an import and a docking tax, both low but unmovable. And Robb did not seem the type particularly interested in piracy, unlike his sister. That would be simple enough—a good, steady consistent stream of income is better than the gross fluctuations, better than none. It was not like the Northern taxes were such a large portion of the South’s coffers that a little reduction would hurt too badly, not when it had been so inconsistent. Trade was like a marriage—inconstancy spelt disaster _._

_(“You would support Robb over me?” she had asked._

_No, he should have said, should have gathered her to his chest, stroked her hair and her tears, kissed her, no, my love, of course not, never, I will raise an army against him, darling, bring him to his knees._

_But they are not Jon and Dany. He will not make love to her in the morning just to knife her by supper.)_

Robb went on and on and on about the benefits of such an arrangement.

_(He_ knows—

_But wait. Sansa knows, too. Of course, she does. She would not risk her lumber trade so_ recklessly _—)_

He nodded, swirled the contents of his cup, swished it between his teeth until it fizzed.

“Lord Manderly would be the person who would be contact first, of course—”

“Of course,” he agreed—

_(What he means: Of course. Of course, this is tied up with Manderly. It was widely known that he and Sansa sparred more than the rest._

_Manderly had been humiliated by Lady Flint, Sansa had appointed her Mistress of Laws._

_Manderly had pushed her to marry, Sansa had dithered._

_Manderly advocated for trade, Sansa had insisted on Northern production of goods._

_Worst of all, Manderly had wanted to be Hand, Sansa had delayed. For six years._

_The North had lost the import tax battle that first year, a terrible loss for Manderly, who had been tasked with rebuilding the coast. He had never swallowed that bitterness, Tyrion could tell, in the way his eyes tracked him in meetings, the way he narrowed his eyes. He does not know if Manderly knows about him and Sansa, knows that if he does, that it, too, would be a slap to him._

_“He’s good for you,” he had told her, “Someone to challenge you.”_

_She had sighed, “You’re probably right. Though I shouldn’t push him so hard,” rolled her eyes, “Else he’ll threaten to rebel.”_

_Tyrion had snorted, “And who would he install as king? A roasted pheasant?”_

_They had laughed.)_

They finished sooner than Tyrion expected and even as he went to collect his sheaves of parchment, drained his cup, Robb sat back to talk, “I am sorry about last evening.”

“Oh?” Tyrion said noncommittedly, twisted the lid back on to the top of his ink pot, “It was not an insult to me, my lord.”

“Still, you are a guest here, it was impolite of us to be so informal.”

“I am your brother’s Hand. I walk amongst Starks every day,” he said.

_(He needs to go. Robb is not Bran. Does not pay him to handle Stark problems. Lumber prices swirl in his head.)_

“Still,” Robb paused expectantly.

“Is there anything else, my lord?” Tyrion asked.

_(Lumber had never been a contested good before. They had fought for days over a three-bushel difference in grain but never lumber—What are you doing, Sansa—)_

“You said you would report any private conversations with Sansa to me—”

_(Oh, yes, that.)_

“—You must have had some since—"

_(“Let me help you relax.”)_

“--You looked like you were in one last evening.”

“Only about the latest poetry from Lys. We have similar taste in books, my lord.”

_(That was true at least. Poor man.)_

“Alright,” Robb did not seem quite satisfied, paused, then, “I do appreciate your kindness to her over the years.”

Tyrion pursed his lips. _(I just didn’t rape her. Nothing more, nothing less.)_

“And to Talisa. She has told me that you have been very courteous. It’s why I approached you.”

_(Oh, Tyrion knows when he’s being wooed.)_

“It is nothing, my lord,” picked up his pot, pen, and papers, made ready to go.

“Still, I do appreciate it,” Robb said, “I know you are a friend to our House.”

_(It’s so genuine, so like Jon, that it makes Tyrion’s chest ache.)_

_(What he wants to say: I am sorry. I am sorry that she will break your heart. She’ll break mine one day soon, too, I am sure. It’s just the Ice Maiden. It’s not Sansa. It’s hard to tell the difference at times, I know, but you’ll learn if you try. And when you learn then you’ll understand that this whole mess is choking her to death.)_

He said: “Thank you, my lord.”

_(What he wants to add: Just give it up, Robb. She loves you so dearly. But you lost before you even began, before you will even realize that there is a game being played.)_

He added: “Good day, my lord.”

\--

Robb had another private meeting with Tyrion, and she used the snub as an opportunity to meet with Lord Glover and Lady Flint.

Lady Flint produced a parchment with neat rows of names, “This is the list of eligible electors. We already know the Hornwoods will be with us, and the Tallharts. I have already heard concerns from the Stouts, the Lakes, and the Condons, so after the election is announced I shall revisit them.”

Lord Glover made a note of that and said, “I have spoken with Lord and Lady Liddel. They were unimpressed by the Prince’s performance in the taxation meeting—”

_(Unsurprising. His information had been three years out of date.)_

“—and the son of the Ironsmiths, Olyvar, I think, was heard in the tavern speaking with the youngest son of the Wulls, against the Prince’s return. Now both are relatively young members of small houses but if we could send your son, Lady Flint, to speak with them, perhaps we can gain a better understanding of their grievances then we might be able to draw in some of the others.”

Sansa said, “We will not tell them about the election unless absolutely necessary. This is about planting doubt, make them desperate for an alternative.”

And so, it went on, assessing each name on the list. Planning for every one’s uncertainty.

“Now, our big concern is that the Prince’s ally is Lord Manderly who has enough influence with the coastal houses that where he votes, they will as well,” Glover said, “They remain opposed to the South, of course.”

“The shipping taxes,” Sansa nodded.

“Yes, now, we’ve discussed that the import tax has been largely replaced in the South by the increase in the docking tax.”

“I am working with Lord Tyrion on the issue. Their forests are still recovering from the dragonfire, they need our lumber more than they need our import revenue. We’ve almost tripled the prices in response.”

_(It had been a gamble that one. Had to conceal the wildling wagons. Thankfully, Tyrion had been too distracted by his reconciliation with Jon.)_

“The bigger concern,” Lady Flint said, delicately, “is that with the fees being what they are, there is worriment about your connections with the South.”

Sansa sighed, “We knew that they were unhappy about the taxes which is why I pledged to make it a priority in this year’s negotiations.”

“It’s become more general concerns that you allow the South too much freedom. That we are no more sovereign than we were as one of the Seven Kingdoms,” Lady Flint said.

“I am not exactly sure the Lord Hand would agree,” Sansa said tartly, “Is this coming from Manderly?”

“We have always known he thought we gave up too much in the first year’s trade agreements and every year subsequently.”

_(The night they had signed those first agreements, they made love for the first time._

_The night they had signed the second year’s agreements, they had argued, and she had told him that she loved him.)_

“He’s been the Prince’s most vocal supporter since his return. Many of the Prince’s opinions in council and in meetings are echoes of things that Manderly has expressed privately,” Lord Glover said.

“Expressed privately, Lord Glover?” Her voice was low, the edge of a threat.

“He wants increased defenses along the borders—”

“Oh yes, well, I knew about that.” Sansa sighed again; her whole spy network had been abuzz two months ago at statements Lord Manderly had made about the defenses at a supper he had held for some of the smaller houses.

“The reduction in our guards along the border fortifications—”

“Was a cost saving measure. It’s ridiculous to have men there when it’s peaceful.”

“Except for the poaching.”

“So, I should put the entire Northern army there to catch a few hungry peasants who were starving in the dead of winter?”

“It has given more credence to the view that you are too friendly to the South.”

Sansa began to tap impatiently on the arm of her chair, nails clicking, “What do they want? We share a border; the King is my brother.”

“And Lord Tyrion is your former husband,” Lady Flint said, a pause, then, “I would be overcautious in that regard, Your Grace.”

The warning hung in the air. Lord Glover looked away, like he was embarrassed, Lady Flint did not.

_(“You and I, Sansa. It was always going to be a tragedy.”)_

Lord Glover ploughed on, “The Prince’s main appeal is that he is a call back to a time when we fought for the North.”

Sansa felt a pain beginning in her head, “I would remind you that I did and do fight for the North.”

“You do not have to convince us,” Lady Flint said, “You have to convince them.”

“It would be helpful, Your Grace,” Lord Glover said, glancing to Lady Flint, “if you announced your intention to marry.”

Sansa raised an eyebrow.

_(“That’s the problem with choices, Sansa, they have consequences. And in this, you have no one to blame for putting you in this position but yourself.”)_

“There is considerable anxiety about the succession,” Lord Glover continued.

“Is there?” She knew there was. Ignored it, “What is the point of all of this if you intend to supplant me in some other way?”

“Your Grace—”

“Would we make this man king?”

“I would presume—”

“What law trumps the other—my sovereignty or my husband’s rights to his wife? What happens if I die during childbirth? Who becomes regent?”

“My Queen—”

“My hand is not on offer, Lord Glover.”

And so, they went on.

\--

Jon attended the council meeting late in the afternoon. They moved through all their business with him and are about to shuffle together their parchments and head to the evening meal when Robb said, “Now that my brother is here—”

_(“He’s not told him!” Petyr says in her ear. It is a sick, excited way he says it, like a spectator at a joust.)_

_“_ —it would seem the time has come to announce the succession plan.”

“Succession plan?” Jon asked, leaning forward.

“Did Sansa not tell you?” Robb asked, eyes flicking between them, “I am resuming the crown.”

_(If it was anyone else, it would be nervous. But it’s Robb and he has too much dignity or pride or both.)_

Jon’s brow furrowed.

Lord Manderly cleared his throat, “You are right, my lord. If we start now, we could have a coronation planned in a moonturn. Lord Tyrion and King Jon will still be here, representatives from our two neighbors. I suppose we should invite the Iron Bank and some of the Free City representatives, but I am not sure that will be necessary—”

“No, no, I don’t want any of that. It would be too much.”

_(Much, much too human.)_

“According to ancient law, we will need to tally the Northern houses, see that they consent to bend the knee,” Lady Flint said.

Lord Manderly spluttered, “He already has been hailed as king.”

_A decade ago,_ Sansa thought. Said nothing.

“It’s a tradition,” said Lord Glover smoothly. Manderly looked ready to protest.

Robb raised a hand to cut Lord Manderly off before he began, “No, Lady Flint, you’re right. It is custom. I need to make amends as well, make my case,” he looked to Sansa then, subtly reached a hand to cover hers under the table, “prove myself worthy of the crown.”

Jon was staring at her. She cast a glance to the ceiling, said not a word.

\--

Jon cornered her outside the council chamber, “What are you playing at, Sansa? I thought you said he _wanted_ to be king, not that you were abdicating!”

“It’s just an election, Jon,” hates how she sounds like Littlefinger, unbothered, cool, “Just because you ran unopposed does not mean that he will.”

Jon saw her meaning, “Sansa—”

“I will not destroy our family, Jon. This is fair. This is the way of the North.” Hates how she sounds like Father, wise, justified.

“Fair?” Jon does not sound weary like Arya did or angry like Robb will, just disappointed, “How is this fair?”

“Have you told him about the truth about you?” Hates how she sounds like Cersei, petty, petulant.

“It’s different, Sansa.”

“Yes, but we are doing it for the same reasons.”

Jon shook his head, “And what could that possibly be?”

“Survival.”

\--

Tyrion was leaving his chambers for supper when he encountered Jon, pacing like a caged wolf.

“Did you know, Tyrion?” he asked.

_(He supposes that they’re friends again.)_

“Know what, Lord Snow?”

“About Robb and Sansa and the election,” he was breathing hard through his nose.

“Lower your voice, Jon,” he hissed, ushered him into his chambers. Checked the corridor, closed the door.

“Yes, I knew, I’ve been here for a fortnight already.”

“And?” Jon looked at him, wide eyed, “And what are they do? One must win and the other must swallow the loss—”

“Sansa is fair. She will not allow him to be punished for this more than he will be.”

“And if she loses?”

_(That will be the question, isn’t it? He had tried to ask her, a few nights ago, gently, tenderly._

_“I thought you said that we were going to run away together,” she says it lightly, shapes it like a jest, but she just sounds exhausted.)_

“She will have to make a choice, I suppose,” he said, “If she does not contest the results or raise an army or have Arya spirit her away, she will be married to Dorne.”

“What are we going to do?” Jon asked, pulled at her lower lip.

“But what, Lord Snow? There’s not much we _can_ do except let this thing that she set in motion take its course.”

“Surely there is something you can do; you have the entire South—”

Tyrion scuffed his boot in frustration, it spilled from him, “You and I are front different lands now, whole other countries. If I support Sansa and Robb becomes king, then I have made an enemy of a neighboring kingdom. If I support Sansa and Robb loses but becomes Hand, then I have still made an enemy of a man who aims to be my friend. It is best—”

“I thought you loved her,” Jon said.

_(If it was anyone else, it would sound cruel and cold and mean, but it’s Jon and he’s too good for that.)_

It stretched out between them. He and Jon had not seen each other in years, only once, briefly, at that conference four years ago.

_(“You better be good to her, Lannister,” Jon says, “I swear to all the Gods, she’s been through enough. You better fucking love her—”)_

“It’s nothing to do with that, Jon,” Eyes found the ceiling, “Do I think Robb will make a good king? Perhaps, with time and with training. Do I know that Sansa already is that—that her skills are more refined, her instincts better, her knowledge greater? Of course. Does a weaker king make it easier for me to get what I want or does a strong and stable North make for a better partner? That is all it is. My council is full of Sansa’s friends and they want to stay away from this. I cannot override them out of my private love for her. Whatever our feelings are, it is nothing to do with the welfare of our countries and our peoples.”

Jon stared at him. Tyrion went on, “You know what I speak of.”

_(“It’s what you must do, Jon, what you must do for the people. Those men, on the road, they did not deserve that fate. What she could do, what she will do, to this city, Jon, they do not deserve that either.”_

_“But she is my Queen.”_

_“She is just a human, like you or me. I know you love her. I do, too. Less successfully than you. But it’s bigger than you or her or me or any love that we bear each other. I am so sorry, Jon.”)_

Jon swallowed, “But it’s _Sansa._ ”

“I know,” Tyrion sighed heavily, “Anyway, I am not sure that the support of a Lannister and a wildling king will actually help her cause.”

Jon sat stiffly on the edge of the bed, “So we do nothing.”

“We do what she needs,” Tyrion said, “And what she needs is to do this herself. There can be no question afterwards that a foreign entity was involved. They will use that against her. She knows that. I think.”

Jon sat as if always ready to move, always prepared for attack.

Tyrion finished, “I will sit back. But you need to make that choice for yourself as well. She is your sister and he is your brother. It is harder to do nothing, Jon, believe me, it is. But consider her and what she wants.”

Jon’s brow creased, ran his hands through his hair, “Alright.”

_(“It must be done, Jon,” Tyrion pleads, clutching at the fetid straw carpeting his cell._

_Jon’s brow creases, runs his hands through his hair, “Alright.”)_

\--

Her mother did her hair for dinner, twisted it to curl and tumble from the top of her head.

Her mother said tensely, “I heard that Robb met with Lord Tyrion today.”

She had not brought up Tyrion even though Sansa could feel her eyes on them anytime they passed by each other in the halls or exchanged a word at the morning meal. It felt like disapproval.

“Well, Robb means to be king, he needs to get to know our foreign allies.”

Robb tried to engage with her at supper and she ground her teeth. Allowed it.

She retired early and reviewed Lady Flint’s list. 

_(Petyr strokes her hair as she bent over the pages, guides her hand as she makes check-marks next to her loyalists, encases her wrist when she circles her dissenters. He is encroaching on her space. Taking up all her air. Again. When she struggles to breathe, he shakes with silent laughter.)_

\--

Later that night: He was thrusting into her, her legs curled around his waist, her hands on his back, his face buried in her breasts, his fingers rubbing her. She was whining, sighing, stretching, so close—

“Tyrion, tell me,” she panted.

“What?” he said, distracted.

“You _know_ what.”

His heart cracked.

His hand briefly left her nub to stroke a lock of hair stuck to her face, eyes locked together, “You’re good.”

Dark pupils, hips jerk, hitched breath, covered her eyes with one hand, the other anchored on his shoulder. His hand returned, and he continued to murmur it, “Sansa, you’re so good, good girl.”

_(Oh, does she love his tenderness.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I was ready to post this chapter. Then had a moment of panic, rewrote the entire thing, like, five minutes ago???? So who knows if this comprehensible? 
> 
> Also, Sansa has a praise kink. We all know this. That is has been your sub-TEDTalk. Thank u for ur time. ;) 
> 
> Thank you, as ever, for reading/commenting/kudos! They are so appreciated! <3 <3 <3


	17. in the silence you've gone and the train comes again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another warning: Non-explicit mentions of child death in this chapter. Read with care. <3

Tyrion rubbed his hand between her shoulder blades, soothed Sansa to sleep, still fitful but better than nothing. He left then. He stepped out from her solar into the corridor. It was later than he had thought, and he had reports to write, correspondence from Davos to answer, and, of course, the pesky niggling feeling that Sansa was doing _something_ with the lumber pricing—

“Lord Tyrion?”

Lovely Talisa.

“Oh, good evening, milady.”

She was looking at him curiously. There was no good reason for him to be in the hall outside the Queen’s bedroom, when everyone else is asleep, no jacket, hair uncombed, so he did not offer one.

_(They’ll have to be more careful, he thinks, with Robb living in this wing now, with Manderly whispering that Sansa’s weakness is the South,_ _that her little lovelorn former husband is trying to take advantage of her.)_

“Couldn’t sleep?” she asked.

Tyrion nodded, “You?”

“Just exploring the new wing. Robb is abed.”

“Good, good,” Uncomfortable quiet so he repeated, “Good.”

“Well, goodnight, my lord.”

“Good night, Lady Talisa.”

He returned to his rooms, whistling slightly. 

_(Maybe he had misunderstood Bran. The lone wolf dies. That was what the instruction had actually said. It is a terrible thought but Bran, for all his divinity did love Sansa in his own way, had suffered at Robb’s hand in his own way, did appreciate the North’s partnership—_

_Damn Bran and his obtuseness._

_Maybe it could be both. That to ensure the survival of the pack, you would have to kill the dreams of one. And Sansa certainly would not go quietly if she lost. He knew that. Jon knew that. Bran knew that._

_Thinks of his advice to Jon the day before, the mournful hang of his head, fatherly hand on his shoulder, “I’ll sit back.”_

_Varys tells him when he released him from his cell that day after Jon kills Dany, “If only more of us were like Jon Snow.” His friend’s words lost when he sees the kingsroad burned black. What a narrow fate to have escaped._

_Then thinks of the pressure of Sansa’s head against his neck, the panic in her eyes and the fervor of her kisses, the falter in her breath, “Robb wants me to marry.”_

_Then later, her fingers delicate at his shoulder, hair spilling everywhere, “If Robb becomes king, it will not be my choice.”_

_But sitting back and staying silent are different, he argues with himself, nudging isn’t pushing._

_Sansa pushed. Pushed, pushed, pushed until everyone had to choose. Him or me. War or peace.)_

He could not concentrate on his correspondence. More urgings at neutrality from Davos. More responses from Bronn about Robb’s counters to Sansa’s trade deals. Words spun. Went to bed instead.

_(He belonged to a pride once, a pride that he had no small part in destroying. As much as the Starks are nursed on honor and loyalty, they are still_ just _a family. And there is always, always a black sheep. No matter how lovely she may be.)_

\--

It was after dinner the next evening. Robb and Talisa retired early. Catelyn left, too, for a walk with Lady Flint, eyes fixed on him as she rose from the table like she knew exactly what he intended with Sansa later that evening. Jon and Arya were off somewhere, stabbing something in the training yard. And Tyrion and Sansa had gone back to her chambers under the pretense of looking at the newest draft of Sansa’s agricultural proposal in her solar.

_(That early afternoon before Sansa had run into the library and dragged him to her bed, he had found Talisa, tears tracking down her cheeks.)_

“May I offer you some advice, love?” he said.

_(He had said something like that to Talisa, too. “My lady, let me offer you some advice.”)_

“Hmmm,” she said. She was seated on the edge of the bed, fingers interlaced, and arms stretched above her head, hair streaming behind her.

_(With the tears, the dark hair, the slight gap in her teeth, in a certain light, she could have been Tysha. It scatters him.)_

“Befriend Talisa.”

_(“My apologies, my lord,” she sniffs. Oh, it_ is _Tysha, word for word.)_

She reached down to touch her toes, pushing the ridge of her spine into relief. He cannot resist skimming his finger down the mountain range. She turned to him, peering at him through the harp-shaped space between her arm and waist, “You said that to me already.”

_(He had, hadn’t he. A week ago. That very night.)_

“And have you?”

_(He knows the answer. She bristles at the condescension.)_

She ignored him, slung on her robe, sashayed to her vanity to braid her hair for sleep, to wash her face, remove her rings. But she was listening.

_(“It’s everything,” Talisa said, patting her eyes with his handkerchief, “Robb is so excited to be home but it’s just so_ much. _Someone keeps putting sand in my soup. No, no, no, I haven’t gone to the Queen. Why? I don’t_ know _her. One minute she’s warm and then cold. I just—”_

_He pats her arm. It makes him feel cruel.)_

“Sansa, why do you think they stayed away so long?”

_(“We called him Ned,” she said, “After. You know.”_

_Oh, does he know.)_

She leaned into her looking glass to examine a blemish that had developed on her chin.

_(“I know they blamed me, her especially, but what was I to do? I could not bring him here, my only boy.”)_

“Have you considered what happens after this farce is over? If you win, what will Robb do? Talisa will be the key to whether this ends in rebellion or peace.”

_(“It’s always me,” she says, “Always my fault.” And then Sansa comes in, ablaze, and Talisa is able to turn her tears into a twinkle. It’s a trick that he realizes later must take some practice.)_

Sansa came back to bed, hips swinging, bit her lip, skid her hands down his torso, stole them beneath the blanket. A distraction. He grabbed her wrist, nipped it, “Don’t make the same mistake that you rely on others to make with you.”

_(There’s something about that conversation that follows him, even everything else that goes on that day in Sansa’s bed, at dinner, back in the library—she only ever called Sansa ‘the Queen.’)_

\--

The next morning Sansa sought out Talisa in the glass gardens.

The glass gardens were hot and moist, a faint steam always rising from the beds of radishes, lettuces, herbs. Tiny beads of sweat of sweat collected in the crease of her neck. She had chosen her dress poorly that morning, a green velvet heavily embroidered with roses, relying on Tyrion’s observation when Jeyne laid it out the night before that it reminded him of the Tyrell sigil.

She had found out from Jeyne that Talisa took her walk through the glass gardens every morning and, true enough, she found her good-sister sitting on a bench shielded by the stunted lemon and orange trees gifted to her by a wealthy merchant from Pentos during his brief courtship.

“Oh, Talisa!” she said, friendly, “Come walk with me.”

“Oh, Your Grace.”

“Sansa, please,” she offered her arm. They made their way around the beds and to the entrance, starting up the path to the godswood.

“I am afraid I have not been a very kind good-sister these past few weeks,” Sansa said, lifting her skirts to step over a puddle, “It has been quite a busy few weeks. Two state visits and then this. Still, it is no excuse.”

“No, no, my lady, we had terrible timing, it seems,” Talisa said, laughingly, “To come while both the North and South were here. Monumentally poor timing.”

In truth, Sansa had never given much thought to Talisa in all the years that she had mourned the deaths of her mother and brother. She was always just a shadow, an incidental fact, an “Oh yes, there was a wife, too. The girl who made Robb betray the North.” Always a shadow. She was not sure what her expectations of Talisa had been, but they had not been fulfilled by their brief mealtime conversations. She was pleasant, honest, sweet, a healer, now _that_ was interesting. She seemed able to endure Catelyn’s criticisms, that was admirable, too. However, she was not the enticing witch that Lord Manderly and Lord Glover had described her to be. _If that’s what they think of her,_ she thought, _they would have combusted upon first sight of Margaery._ Sansa had known women who had brought kingdoms to their knees, whose desirers had waged war for them in exchange for a look, she _was_ one of those women. Talisa was a surprising member of their ranks.

_(When she first begins bringing Tyrion into her bed, she finally begins to understand how dangerous desire is. She lay, one night, panting and sweating atop him—“So that’s why we went to war,” she gasped, Tyrion had let out a little breathless sound like a laugh. But the moment passes and she realizes what is more damning, more addictive than the beauty of his face, or the way the shape of his body pleases her, greater than the explosive, temporary pleasure is all the rest: how Tyrion tucks himself around her and the way he says her name.)_

They walked under the arching boughs of evergreens that bordered the godswood, hems catching and pricking on the dry needles underfoot.

“Robb is so glad to be home, he has missed this place so,” Talisa said, “He has talked of little but for the past eight years.”

“We have been at peace for six of the eight.” _(It’s sharper than she intends.)_

Talisa flushed slightly, “We had little news in Volantis. We lived very leanly there. Not much in the way of resources.”

_(Sansa does not quite believe that. Dragons and the dead come to life is news that tends to travel. But she lets it go, she’s been told greater lies for lesser reasons.)_

“I thought your family was from the city?” she asked.

“They were but when we arrived, we discovered a fever had swept the city. They died. A cousin took over the house,” a pause, “He was not very hospitable.”

_(Sansa can see the shades, gray, shifting, uncertain, between Talisa’s words. Her mother’s realization that they were to be sent out to the street, what Robb would have done—he would have wanted to provide whatever way he could._

_She begins to play her little game.)_

They walked in silence for a moment before Talisa said, “I understand why you and Arya are angry with him. It is alright truly, deserved even.”

_(She_ is _forward, isn’t she? She would have challenged Robb, wouldn’t she? The shades take on shapes.)_

“We are not angry,” So used to diplomacy, the words slip beyond her teeth before Sansa could stop them, “It _is_ disorienting, however.”

“Of course, trust me, I do understand,” Talisa said, with a small chuckle, “It is a lovely place, though. Winterfell. I see why Robb loves it so much.”

“Thank you.”

“I have heard so much of you all as well. Arya and you and Jon. Even Lord Tyrion, the Imp,” she smiled, “He has been a most kind friend.”

_(Oh, she bets he has been. The god of tits and wine that he is. “Are you jealous, darling?” He had laughed at the mere thought. But he had still called Talisa lovely.)_

“You are close, are you not?” Talisa asked.

_(She can still feel the burn of his beard on her thighs from the night before.)_

“We have been allies for many years. We work together closely now.”

“That must be nice, to have such a long-lasting friendship.” 

_(“Tyrion,” she whispers, “You’re my best friend.”_

_He had looked so sorrowful, makes her feel wrong and pathetic for saying it, but she cannot lie._

_It echoes again, “You and I, Sansa. It was always going to be a tragedy.”_

_But when? She should have asked: Tell me when you will leave me, my love, so I can prepare.)_

They were passing through the more neglected part of the grounds, where they are still rebuilding, overgrown and tangled with weeds. The garden walls were still pockmarked from battle, an ash-black streak gashing down the sides.

“Oh!” Talisa stopped, pointing to a patch of white and yellow flowers, “A neighbor in Volantis had these in a window box. Little Ned used make flower chains from them. Drove us mad.”

_(The nephew that she never knew. His shadow shape matches Rickon, no more than three.)_

“Oh,” Talisa gestured to a patch of shiny ferns, “those are to make moon tea.”

_(Those Sansa knows, tends to them herself. Wonders how well Talisa knows them, too. There has never been another child. Remembers Robb sipping her tea without a second thought. Maybe there’s less honesty in Talisa than she supposed.)_

“Why, my whole medicine kit is here!” she said, laughing, pointing out more herb patches, stubbornly pushing their heads between the weeds.

“This was Maester Luwin’s garden, he was known for his skill in herbs. Maester Wolkan has had so little time to spend in it. You should have full use of this place, bring it back to life.”

Talisa replied, “Though I suppose there will not be much time for me either once I am queen.”

“No. I don’t suppose so. Running a household is very time consuming,” she said, “As I am sure my mother has informed you.”

Talisa returned her sly smile, “Many times.” A beat, “Being queen was not my plan.”

“It rarely is,” Sansa said, offered her arm again and they continued to walk along the remnants of Maester Luwin’s paths, “Tell me about Ned. I have heard so little of him.”

_(Talisa does and the shades between her words become sharper, develop faces._

_Sansa can picture Talisa as a mother, direct, honest, healer that she was, how meticulous she would be in her child’s care. She can see Robb, too, as a father. More laughing than Ned, more cautious, too.)_

They circled around the yard, past Bran’s tower.

_(She learns that Little Ned was mischievous, loved horses, had a friend named Lyle. His shade reforms. He was never Rickon, she realizes, he was Bran.)_

“How old was he?” she asked.

“Six, just shy of his seventh name-day. Another fever in the city.” Talisa said.

_(Sansa recognizes that voice, the carefully constructed neutrality.)_

“I am sorry,” she said, squeezed Talisa’s forearm.

_(Sansa has never had a quick head for numbers. But she works it out as they continue to amble across Winterfell towards the training yard, as Talisa asks about a horse to learn to ride. A journey to Volantis was eight months. She would have had to give birth on the road. He would have to have died mere months before they would have booked passage home._

_The shades become bright with color. Direct, honest, lovely Talisa. Talisa from Volantis. Talisa whose bones and blood were not of the North, could never understand what it was like to be bound so inextricably to the land._

_Sansa can see it all suddenly. How in the panic and horror of the Red Wedding, it would have been Talisa who bandaged Robb and Catelyn’s wounds. How it would have been her who booked the boat to Volantis. She can see the pact made between a mother and a father.)_

They stop outside the stables, Talisa clasped her arm, “This has been lovely, Sansa, truly.”

“It has! We shall have to do this again. There is a lovely patch of woods just beyond Winterfell where I like to ride at times.”

“We shall have to,” Talisa turned to go, stopped, “Sansa, I know that you are upset with what Robb said the other night, even if you deny it. It is alright,” a breath, “He just wants to do what is right.”

_(There was a reason why the Kings of Winter had been forced to marry the land. It was so it could never be rent from them by the will of another, no matter how lovely.)_

“I understand,” Sansa said, squeezed her good-sister’s hand, “I am truly glad to have met you after all these years.” 

_(She cannot lie.)_

Talisa threw a smile over her shoulder as she made her way back inside, Sansa stayed in the yard, circled back to the training yard where she caught sight of Robb, sweating, grinning, hand on the shoulder of a young squire, fixing his grip on the hilt of his practice sword. He caught her eyes and waved. She waved back.

_(“How did you know?” Arya had asked. She had said something about men and knowing what they wanted. But more than that she knew Robb. Robb, who had always asked her first to dance at feasts, who always apologized before Father asked him to, who would still pause to kiss her cheek even as he and Theon were always, always, always, rushing to do something without her._

_Most things change. Some stay the same._

_Jon would always bristle at the mention of his mother, Arya would never pick up her scraps from the floor, and Robb would always want to be leader of the pack.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yo yo cheerios! Poor Talisa and Robb and Sansa and Arya and Catelyn and Tyrion and all of them. :-( I hope this gives a little bit more color to why Robb stayed away. The next two chapters get real sad/angry so get ready to don your angst protection equipment. ;) 
> 
> i always appreciate the comments/feedback/kudos/etc. but so especially this past chapter. it was a rough week over here and they were just so uplifting and a nice distraction during a not so great time!! <3 :*


	18. and the children she bore loved this truly too much

Arya did not appear at the midday meal. But Sansa and Talisa sat together.

_(There is something lighter in her. There’s still Robb and the election and the southern negotiations and Lord Manderly and the agricultural proposals that she just has to get right and her mother and her mother knowing about her scars and Tyrion catching on to her lumber tricks and the thought that her tragedy is that he will just grow tired of what she is becoming or that he said that terrible thing to throw her off his scent and she will not know which until it’s too late for them both and Arya slipping away and Jon’s disappointment and Jon wanting to help her and how sleepless her nights have been and—_

_“Let me help you relax,” he whispers, “What do you want, sweet girl? Tell me what you want.”_

_What happens when you’re gone? That’s more of her thoughts than she wishes to admit.)_

She could not quite bring herself to speak with Robb, not just yet, but he still looked pleased when she chose to sit near Talisa and enquire if she had settled on the furnishings for the new royal apartments.

_(She misses Margaery. She would be able to name what grows within her.)_

“I spoke with the maester about the gardens,” Talisa said quietly.

“Oh, good!” Sansa replied, “I was in the library after I left you and I saw a tract on Northern herbalism. I thought of you." 

_(It’s the way that Talisa listens without looking for the gaps in her words, she finally decides, can’t remember what that’s called._

_Arya, Jon, Jeyne, and Tyrion know her for true. Her mother is beginning to see it. Robb refuses to, won’t try. Talisa does not seem to care. Not yet._

_“Don’t get sentimental, sweetling,” Petyr reprimands, “We know where that gets us.”)_

Robb said something but she could not bear to pay him any mind, let Jon answer for her.

“Sansa said that next week she will show me some of the riding paths outside Winter Town,” she heard Talisa telling Robb and Jon. Robb cast a glance at her, smiling slightly, squeezed Talisa’s hand in practiced affection, felt Tyrion’s eyes on her, watched Robb kiss Talisa’s cheek together.

_(Robb thinks they’re healing, that she is melting after a month of frostbite.)_

_(Maybe she is.)_

_(Then Robb says something to her as the whole party is departing and she cannot do it. Not right now. Too envy-green. Too rage-bound.)_

\--

_(Still, she floats a little.)_

\--

Tyrion came to her in her solar, eyes glittering, “I will not make you beg your thanks to me.”

 _He is so irritating_ , she thought, but her humor is better than it has been in three weeks, so she rolled her eyes, leaned forward, hooked her index finger into his top buttonhole, gaping open under his chin, “I don’t beg, Lord Hand.”

“I seem to recall _something_ that resembled begging last night—”

“That’s interesting because I seem to recall you begging in my solar yesterday afternoon. ‘Oh please, Your Grace, I just need you to continue your wine orders to Highgarden, oh pl—‘”

He cut her off with a brief chaste kiss, pulled back laughing, and so she laughed, too.

Then he turned serious, “I really do need you to do that. Until we diversify the crops, the vineyards are really carrying the southern eco—”

For some reason, his lecture only made her laugh more, she kissed him, smiling, “You’re starting to sound like me.”

_(It feels like centuries since they’ve been like this. The past few weeks, every jape has felt like a wound, every encounter so charged with wrath—she is so tired of watching him watch her with worry—)_

He scoffed at her, “Now, really, Sansa—”

She kissed him again but soon it’s really him kissing her—

_(She is so close to recapturing their joy—)_

Then there was a knock. They sprang away from each other, her finger catching as she removes it from his collar, “Come in.”

It was Lady Flint. Her eyes flashed and Sansa realized suddenly that their ankles were crossed beneath the table. Sansa shifted subtly.

“I am sorry to interrupt, Your Grace, but I have finished with the draft of the agricultural proposals. You said to come and review it with you when I was done.”

_(She had.)_

_(As Tyrion takes his leave and Lady Flint sits, concern creased in her brow, and she feels like she’s slowly being pinned back to earth, a little firmer this time, just to make sure she does not forget what they’re trying to do. It jaundices her blood.)_

\--

_(Her feet are firmly in the mud the rest of the day.)_

\--

That evening, Arya appeared to her for the first time in three days. She lounged in Sansa’s chambers, rattling off the daily spy reports while Sansa sat by the fire and dipped strips of the white Lysene silk in oil.

“What are you doing?” Arya asked tiredly.

“New gown.” She wrung the last strip out, holding it to firelight, it shone with an unnatural brightness.

“Are you planning on sewing it or frying it?”

Sansa ignored her and returned to examining the silk’s sheen.

There was a knock and Sansa called, “Yes?”

“It’s Mother.”

Arya pulled a face and Sansa gave her a warning look, she carefully rolled up her cloth samples, tucking them away in her sewing basket, “Come in!”

Catelyn entered, “Hello, girls.”

“Good evening, Mother,” Sansa said, sitting back in her chair, picking up a much less damning embroidery wheel, “Please, sit.” _(Always remember your courtesies.)_

Catelyn did, taking the chair opposite Arya, who curved her body protectively inward, and said, “I heard you exchanged words with Robb a few evenings ago.”

_(A flash of memory: “He’s just a child, Sansa.”_

_“He_ cut _my gown!”_

_“He’s four years old.”_

_“I will never forgive him!”_

_“You must, Family, Duty, Honor. That means forgiveness. Come now, I will help you fix it. See? It’s just the left seam.”)_

A shiver of indignation rippled down Sansa’s neck, “I exchange many words with my brother.”

“Sansa,” a warning, then gentle, “You know what I am speaking of.”

“Yes, I do. I am not sure why it is any concern of yours.” She concentrated on the needle, flicking it in and out.

Arya shifted again, hackles up. Like a wolf.

“He is very sorry. You should speak with him.”

“If he wanted to speak with me, he could come to my chambers himself instead of hiding behind his mother’s skirts.”

_(Even Petyr hisses, “Gentle, sweetling.”)_

“He tried.”

In and out. In and out. Arya twisted her neck like she was trying to rid herself of a pain.

A pause.

“I know, Robb knows, you two are angry with us,” Catelyn said, “You have more than every right to be. But we are still one House. Family, Duty, Honor—”

_(Something in the air breaks open.)_

“Family, Duty, Honor!” Arya crowed, startling both Sansa and Catelyn, “Family, Duty, Honor, Mother, died when you should have.”

_(Sansa rarely thought of Arya as being angry, not the way Sansa could flare, but maybe it was because it was always there. Always just below the skin.)_

“Arya—”

“No, Sansa, no. She’s seen your back; she knows what she did.”

_(Another memory: Sansa in Arya’s bed, after the Long Night, could not sleep alone, lying straight and parallel._

_“Did you know I was there?” Arya says, “At the Twins, that night.”_

_“What?” Sansa moves to her side, tucks her hand around her neck to support her head._

_“The Hound took me there and we arrived that night. It had kicked off right before we got there. I watched the whole thing, the screams, the people, them chopping off Grey Wind’s head.”_

_Sansa touches Arya’s shoulder, “Oh, Arya.”_

_Silence._

_“What did it feel like? To be that close?”_

_Arya laughed mirthlessly, “I was worried the whole day we rode to the castle that Mother wouldn’t like my hair.”)_

Arya was quiet, “Do you know how to skin a man?”

Catelyn did not respond.

“I do,” Arya leaned forward, “I went to Braavos and learned. I learned how to poison and garotte and fight. And then when I was done, I learned how to skin my victim’s faces and dry them and then put them on my own so I could go poison and garotte and fight without the inconvenience of someone recognizing me. And why did I do that?”

She smiled, teeth like knives. Catelyn turned her face and Arya shifted even farther forward in her seat, “To avenge you. You and Robb and Father and Sansa and Bran and Rickon. Our house. I did not rest a single day until all who had harmed our family was dead. House Frey is a memory because of me. Petyr Baelish is dead because of me. Death _itself_ was obliterated because of me. And what did you do? You got on a boat to Volantis.”

_(“Why did you never go and find her?” she asks Tyrion one night, three years ago. She means Tysha._

_“I didn’t know where she’d gone,” he asks, to the bed canopy more than her, “And besides, what would I even say to her?”_

_“Well—”_

_“Sansa, there’s only so much pain a person can take and only so much a person can inflict. Sometimes it’s best just to let it all lie.”)_

“Family, Duty, Honor,” Arya repeated, “Is that what you told yourself when you came to King’s Landing—oh yes, Lady Catelyn, I heard about that—did you even think to take us, knowing that the Lannisters had made enemies of our father and tried to kill our brother? Family, Duty, Honor. Is that what you told Robb when he decided to make an enemy of the Freys? Did you even consider what would have happened to Sansa, married to a Lannister, or was that just her duty, too? To honor her new family?” Arya scoffed, “Did you even wonder where I was?”

Catelyn’s jaw tightened like she was armoring herself against Arya’s words, letting them batter her, when she spoke, it was more tired than anything, “Of course, we did. But what would you have done, Arya? Robb was injured. Our friends were dead. Talisa was with child. When he recovered, she would not stay, and he would not go from her side. What was I to do? Leave my son? Leave my grandchild? Storm King’s Landing and steal you away on foot—”

“We were children! _Your_ children!”

“So was Robb!”

“But it’s always been Robb, hasn’t it?” Arya said, twisted towards the fire, cast her own face into jumping shadow, “Your _boy_.” Spat in the direction of the hearth, “Family, Duty, Honor. A pity that when you said them you only truly meant Sansa and I.”

That was the accusation that wounded her mother most, she could see in the spalling of her face, “Arya, don’t—”

“Father would have stayed.”

_(Someone finally, finally, finally says it.)_

“Your father was dead.”

_(There it is: the source of it all.)_

Arya leaned forward, “Alright, but then why stay away? We won the North nearly seven years ago. Why stay away, Lady Stark? Too craven to face your own people with the shame of what you’d wrought?”

_(“You could try now, try to find her,” Sansa says, she knows she’s pushing him, hurting him, but she is preoccupied with this other woman, this woman that he had loved so deeply, that knew the same pain she had, “We’re at peace now.”_

_Maybe she’s trying to make him go, heal, maybe she’s trying to get him to stay, heal with her._

_“I won’t go,” Tyrion says, didactic, “_ because _we’re at peace now. Sometimes you just need to rest.”)_

Catelyn Stark had a remarkable talent for being able to cut people off, strike fear into them with quiet words. It was something Arya had inherited.

Arya shook her head, as if in disbelief, “What fine words for a dead House.”

Catelyn did not answer, turned her head, and Arya stood, triumphant, “Good night, Sansa, Mother, I have to rise early tomorrow.”

Arya strode to the door and Sansa made no move to stop her. Neither did Catelyn. The door slammed.

Arya’s tirade had sucked Sansa’s own anger from her, left her with a heaviness.

_(She is just so dense with sadness.)_

“You must hate me, us,” Catelyn croaked.

Sansa bent her head over her embroidery, “It’s not hate, Mother, you must know that.”

Catelyn leaned back her head back, closed her eyes, no tears tonight, “What is it then?”

“It’s family, it’s duty, it’s honor.”

\--

Catelyn did not come to brush her hair the next morning and that seemed to hurt more than all the rest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More fun facts with your friendly fanfic-writing archaeologist: In Bronze Age Mycenae (Trojan War-era Greece), noblewomen would dip their silken gowns and robes in oil to make them shine. This being GoT, I took GRRM's advice and dialed the effect of this method up to 11. So I picture Sansa's silk scrap being like Disney Princess-level SPARKLY. (*inner six year old me squeals with delight*) 
> 
> Thanks for your comments and kudos!! They always make me smile! :) <3


	19. and so soften me now, let me take as it's given

_(Three days. Three days without her mother in the morning. Three days without her sister in the evening.)_

The election was becoming less and less an idea, spun from her vanity table, and more and more a reality. Letters flew in—some questioning, some enthusiastic, some concerned, some threatening—and Sansa had Lady Flint send her youngest son to spend his days in the raven’s tower, collecting, collecting, collecting.

“What an opportunity for Willem,” his mother gushed at a council meeting when it was noted that Willem was seen trailing after the raven master, “to see how the North communicates.”

“A fine young man,” Lord Manderly said generously, “That’s what I taught my boys, work your way up. You cannot govern if you do not understand _what_ you are ruling.”

Sansa could not help but agree.

She spent most of her nights at her desk, noted each letter’s contents on Lady Flint’s list, responded to each and every one:

_‘Will there now be two monarchs?’_

_‘No,’_ she wrote.

_‘Are you in trouble?’_

_‘No,’_ she wrote, _‘but I call you here anyway.’_

_‘Does this mean war, Your Grace?’_

_‘No,’_ she wrote, less steady, _‘not if you,’_ scratched that out, ‘ _we do the right thing.’_

By the third night, Jeyne needed to lend her four new sticks of sealing wax.

Her Lysene silk remained in the corner of her chamber, tucked away.

\--

Manderly grew bold. Her mother still did not appear. Arya only visited briefly to return a book.

_(Talisa and Robb must know because Talisa pats her hand at breakfast the day after and does not inquire after Arya. Robb does not explain where Mother is, just watches Sansa with regretful eyes. It’s just the three of them breaking bread at the table in her solar now.)_

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked, grasping Arya’s hand.

Arya shook her head, “I am too tired tonight.”

_(“It’s alright to cry, Sansa,” Jon tells her on the second night after she tells him what happens, “Sometimes it helps.” Jarl taught him that, he says. She suddenly hates Jarl.)_

“Oh,” she said.

Arya kissed her cheek and left.

_(When Jon leaves and Tyrion comes, and she tells him, and he holds her hand and she tries. She cannot.)_

\--

Manderly grew bolder still. Lord Glover left that afternoon’s meeting, trembling with the effort of staying silent.

“He dares to suggest that we should end all trade with the south until the import taxes go his way!” he seethed later in Sansa’s solar, Sansa had learned the best way to handle Glover was to let him speak until he ran out of breath.

Glover continued, “He would rather sit and watch our lumber trade wither and die, our wool trade wither and die, our artisans—which I sat for three months listening to him go on and on and on about—wither and die! Let our people starve for Southron goods—goods he insisted _for years_ we needed to import. And for what? A few dragons more for _his_ houses, _his_ vassals. Not mine. Not Flint’s. We already have put the Forrests on edge by playing games with their lumber stocks like this,” he shook his head, “He is Master of Coin! Surely he should want to bring _in_ coin.”

Sansa soothed, “Robb has not brought up this up in his meetings with the Lord Hand.”

She instead inflamed, and Glover stood and began to pace, “What is it about those meetings? It is an insult to you, an insult to all of us, that they have insisted upon those meetings—”

“He means to become king. And if he doesn’t, then he will still need a place in the North. He will need to develop a relationship with Lord Tyrion sometime.”

“We should put him in his place. Right now. We should have done it right away, sent him from here. None of this election nonsense—”

_(They’ve been over this before._

_“It needs to be fair,” she says, “If we run him out, or threaten him, or hide him, it will only poison him against us. It will only give legitimacy to any and every green boy who seeks to be the next Kingmaker.”)_

“We should have—” Glover was seemingly too frustrated to figure out what they should have done, threw up his hands instead, “It’s an insult. And _so_ like Manderly. He’s always been overly concerned with the Lord Hand, always watching his movements, always reminding about—” He stopped suddenly.

Sansa arched an eyebrow, “About our marriage? Our friendship?”

_(She knows. Heard from spies, from Tyrion himself, what Manderly thinks. It is not her fault that the trade deals with the South have been so lackluster, so unlike the stunning victories they have achieved with Pentos and the Iron Bank. Never mind their countries’ histories, never mind that Bran is her brother, never mind that she has no interest in stirring economic unrest in their immediate neighbors._

_It is the silver-tongued Imp, the Imp who had told their Queen, ‘We should have stayed married.’_

_Maybe it is her fault, too, for not telling him no.)_

In some cruel twist of fate, at that moment, Tyrion knocked and entered, “Do you have a moment, Your Grace? I need clarification on the Night’s Watch transport.”

_(He could go to Jon for that, she thinks. Sees it on Glover’s face._

_Petyr appears, holds her hand, wraps an arm around her shoulder, like a father, like a lover, “You and him, Sansa, it was always going to be a tragedy.”)_

\--

Two more days passed. The bolt of white cloth sat still untouched. She ran out of more wax.

Jon gifted her his. Embraced her when he came to her chamber to give it to her, “You need to rest, Sansa, you’ll drive yourself mad.”

_(She sees Daenerys’ bright eyes. Remembers the crumbling trees, blackened to ash. Jaime and Cersei’s golden bodies hoisted into more fire._

_Tyrion had asked her, his Hand pin glinting dully in more light of another fire, “You are free, Sansa, now what do you want? What do you want for your people?”)_

“I am not mad, Jon,” laughed to show it, stroked the side of his face, “Just a bit tired is all. Maybe we can ride tomorrow? Out to the lake?”

He nodded, smiled.

\--

They do not have time on the morrow.

\--

“There is a rumor in White Harbor that Robb is Azor Azhai, from the red priests,” Lord Glover said. Robb was meeting with Tyrion again and she was with Lord Glover and Lady Flint.

“Does that mean they are no longer are erecting effigies of the Princess Arya?” Sansa asked, bored.

_(She’s just so tired. Wants to rest. Can’t. Keeps going, going, going.)_

“No, well, it’s just one red priest, I guess,” Lord Glover said, squinting at his spy report. He discarded it, “Hopefully, it stays to one.”

Sansa sighed, “Well, I suppose something like that was inevitable.”

“We sent out the call to all the houses for the election,” said Lady Flint, “It gives us a fortnight.”

“Let’s go over the names again,” Sansa said.

And so, they did. More checkmarks. Some circles. Too many unmarked.

Lord Glover left with instructions to take his midday meal with the newly married Lord Whitehill whose fresh-faced bride had lost a brother at the Red Wedding. Lady Flint stayed behind.

“I did not want to bring it up again with Lord Glover,” Lady Flint said, “but, as I am sure you are aware, there are whispers about you and Lord Tyrion.”

“There are whispers about everything. There are whispers that Daenerys Targaryen still flies her dragons beyond the wall.”

Lady Flint leaned forward, “But these are true, aren’t they?”

“Lady Flint—”

“I do not begrudge you for it, Your Grace, after what you have done, but your connection creates complications,” Lady Flint was never unkind, just honest, “Lord Manderly has recommended the private meetings with Lord Tyrion because he thinks that the Prince will more unbending to the South, that Lord Tyrion will be more willing to respect someone that he did not marry as a child. That’s what he’s telling your brother anyway.”

_(She wondered briefly what she would have been like if Lady Flint had mothered her. But she abandons the thought as soon as it comes—useless.)_

“I know,” she said, throat tightening, “I know that he knows.”

“We are your council, Your Grace, it is our duty to know.”

Bit her lip, “He suspects that Lord Tyrion is why I will not marry. That he is the cause of my Southron agreements.”

_(Oh, to say it aloud. “Never say a secret out loud,” Petyr had said, “Speaking it makes it true.”)_

Lady Flint touched her hand.

_(Her mother had done that once, too, when she had an argument with Jeyne, “It’s alright, Sansa, we’ll mend it.”)_

“Do many people know?”

_(Her fear is, greater than that of people knowing. It is that she does not know what they know, that she will be surprised by her own people.)_

“No, not for certain. Though you have been less than discreet this year.”

_(It’s true. Of all the visits to shed their discretion, she berates, she had gotten lazy, complacent. Sneaking off in the middle of the afternoon, love marks, sleeping together, it was stupid, stupid, stupid of them, of_ her.

_“Sweetling, you’re no better than the rest of us, now, are you?” Petyr says.)_

“You and your brothers are more alike than you might like to think, my lady,” Lady Flint continued, “All of you, it seems, have chosen to love people who would mean straying from the paths you have been set or set for yourselves. What distinguishes you from the rest is that you have chosen to prioritize duty over love, your people over yourself. I suppose the King Jon did as well, but far too late for most of our liking. To continue this way may not mean that we will lose, I am not so dramatic as to suggest that, but the Prince and Lord Manderly may be very angry when they do lose. And this is a weak point at a time when you are more than vulnerable already. If Robb or any other enemy were to find out for certain and make it public…” she trailed off.

_(She knows what she has to do before Lady Flint even finishes speaking.)_

\--

She waited until she is sure the castle is asleep before she visits Tyrion. He had fallen asleep with a book still in his hand. He was always so sprawling, for a person so small always took up so much space. His books piled up in the corners, his jacket and shirt slung over the chair, his thick fur rumpled on the ground. It looked as if he had lived here for years instead of little more than three weeks.

_(It fills her heart with affection and her chest aches.)_

She slid beside him, woke him with kisses, took the book from his hands. His smile was sleepy, pretty. She kissed him, hand in hair, one on his neck, massaging, one part of her always aware of the pain of his joints, guided his hands to curl under her arms around to her shoulders.

_(The desire she has for Tyrion came as a surprise. Her body has always been an instrument of her own pain. Joffrey, Ramsay. She expects when she first realizes what she wants from Tyrion that she would have to exorcise Ramsay. She’s been had, had more than most women she reckons, the pain worse than most but surely, she thinks, it must always present. Lysa’s screams echo against her ears. She knows pain. She just doesn’t want to fear it anymore. But the ache she feels when Tyrion leans in is so different. That first time, when he slides his hands along her thighs, fingers her scars, she is gasping, heaving.)_

“Sansa, love—"

“Let me take care of you, sweetheart,” she said, her knees bordering his, pressed kisses down his chest and belly, eyelashes glancing off his skin. He arced. She took his length in her mouth, kissed it too, hollowed her cheeks, eyes met his, alight even in the dark.

“Oh,” he sighed, exhaling like he was a storm.

_(“Why does it hurt?” She wants to know._

_“Is it a bad pain?” he asks, pausing._

_She shakes her head though she’s not sure how it’s true, demands, “Can you make it stop?”_

_Can you make it keep going? That is what she means._

_He knows. Tyrion smiles, “Yes. Yes I can.”)_

He just about came apart at her ministrations and she pulled back just as his hips began to stutter, as his sounds fractured. Sat back, waited. When he calmed slightly, she went back down, started all over, waited to feel his fingers clutch at her head. Push. Pull.

_(When his fingers brush up at the apex of her thighs, between her she actually cries out, “What_ is _that?”_

_“Have you never touched yourself?” he asks her._

_“What? No.” Looks at him as if he was japing, he’s not, and she is confused, “Septa Mordane said that,” she stumbles over the words, “to think of those things were a sin.”_

_“Ah,” he says, kisses her cheek, “And did you ever think of them anyway?”_

_She thinks of the kissing games she played with Jeyne, the way she thought about Loras touching her, how she squirmed then leaned in at the things Margaery told her happened behind closed doors, Petyr’s kiss made her feel so fuddled, and she nods. He smiles. He lets her lay her head on his shoulder as he strokes her. Closes her eyes because it is just too much sensation, too much warmth, and wetness, and ache, and pleasure.)_

“Oh Gods,” he called, quietly, still she hushed him, stroked her hands down his thighs, he called again, “Oh Gods, Sansa.”

_(She feels something growing in her, a great pressure, and she just wants it to burst, “What’s happening, Tyrion, what is it?”_

_“It’s alright, I’ve got you, let go, darling, I have you.”_

_She’s shaking, actually shaking, clutching at him like an anchor as her body crests and swells with sweetness. She’s distantly aware that she wants to cry out, covers her mouth, bites her knuckles to stop herself. She can’t even feel her own teeth, sinking into her hand._

_When it is done, she feels wrung out, like she’s just fallen from a great height._

_She weeps a bit, does not know why, and he lies against her, helps her wipe the tears away, doesn’t say a thing.)_

She made her way back up his body to kiss him, spread herself against him, traced his face and throat and chest and arms with her fingertips. She could feel the softness of his flesh, the perseverance of his bones, palms where his heart thuds, walks down the staircase of his ribs. He shuddered and she kissed him again.

_(She finds he can hook her breath with the flutter of his fingers.)_

He wanted to be in her, she could tell, by the way he is pushing at her night dress, angling his hips. She reached up above her head, shed her nightgown and now bare. His hands go to her breasts, tweaked at her nipples, felt their weight. It made her boneless. Her hand went above his head, rested on the pillows, other hands reaches between to guide him inside. He cupped her face and she closed her eyes.

_(What she doesn’t expect is the wash of guilt and the memory of Septa Mordane and the verses of the Maiden that choke her, chain her legs so they close the minute Tyrion moves from between them. Makes her turn away, cover herself, pushes him away, lies next to him without touching.)_

He glided into her. Eyes stayed closed. Knew what he looked like anyway, the reverence, the love. For the past six years, she had gobbled it up, most unladylike. She did not want to see it anymore. But then he let another longing sound and she cannot help it. It wrecked her.

_(She doesn’t tell him until he’s touched her several more times, when that overwhelming, drowning feelings becomes an expectation, a goal, until she sees him experience it, too, head tipped back, face slack, feral moans, jawline cutting._

_“My septa said this was a sin,” she says, it sounds childish, and Tyrion’s grin makes her feel shy, awful, dirty. He slides a hand down her bare arm and even that feels like too much._

_“I thought the North didn’t follow the way of the Seven anymore,” he says._

_“But still—”_

_He doesn’t argue with her, “I’m sure it can be sinful if done improperly. But if your septa saw the way you just peaked, I’m sure that she couldn’t help but agree you were nothing but_ divine. _”)_

He came first this time, muttering mad, mindless praises and her name. His seed spilled inside her and all she could think as he guided her to sit above his face is that she will need Jeyne to make another batch of moon tea. Then he began to lap at her and at himself in her and she pitched forward, caught herself on the headboard.

_(She decides, as her thighs cradle his head, that this is as good a reason as any to not rebuild the sept. Shame washes through her at the mere thought, almost makes her rear up, push him away, but then he does that_ thing _with his tongue and she can’t quite manage it. Then she thinks that of everything that has happened since her septa’s lessons and her septa’s death, this is, by far, the least of her sins.)_

Her climax rumbled within her, sharp and low and good. He continued to taste her past the height of her pleasure, and she cannot help but adore him for it. She comes again, right after, and she just about wept at its intensity, how it turned her bones to fire. She slumped, no bones, no muscle, no sinew, beside him. She needed to tell him but instead she kissed him. Tasted herself, himself, mingled together.

_(When he goes to leave for home, his home, she feels a strange panic. She will miss his company, to be sure, but she will miss that pleasure, too. And she is so threadbare from all the leave-taking.)_

“You’re beautiful,” he told her as he wrapped his arm about her middle, every part of him warm.

She never believed him when he told her that. Never knew what to say until: “You are, too.”

He laughed.

_(He laughs when she tells him in the library the night before he leaves. It is the first time she had heard that in a long time and it makes her so_ glad _even if it is at her expense. And it is that moment that she realizes: Oh, stupid girl, you’ve fallen in love him, haven’t you?)_

Finally, when her skin no longer feels aflame, when all the sound left was the papery drift of his hands on her skin, tracing the dip of her waist, soothing her, she said, “Lady Flint is worried that if Robb finds out about this that he will use it against me.”

_(She’s ruining everything again. She has always been so afraid of everyone going away from her. And here she is going away from him.)_

“He would be an idiot not to,” was all Tyrion said. He paused, “He doesn’t know though, does he?”

“I don’t know but the maidservants gossip. And now my mother knows and Arya’s made a mess of that. It will only be a matter of time.”

She could feel his nod against her shoulder. “She suggested that we stop,” she murmured, she tried to make it better, could not, sounded false, “For now, at least. Until the election is over.”

_(But then, he thinks, she thinks, there will be Robb—angry, hurt, vengeful even—and Lord Manderly and the matter of the vassals who did not support Sansa and then there will be the question of succession and—)_

“I would recommend that myself if I were her. There was no alternative to a Lannister lover before. Now, with Robb, there is. I told you a few days ago, darling, it was always going to be a tragedy.” Resigned.

“Oh.”

_(How does he always know? Always before her?)_

_(Whenever he falls in love, he plays a little game.)_

“It is not my choice,” she said finally.

_(How ironic.)_

“It is not mine either, Sansa. It is just the nature of these things.”

_(She knew that. She just thought they would have more_ time _.)_

He turned away from her then, so she could not see his face.

_(The remainders of their lovemaking feel cold and tacky, drying uncomfortably on her thighs, like something disgusting—)_

Finally: “And so, I guess my watch begins again.”

She attempted to laugh, came out like a sob.

_(She loved and hated how calm he was. Loved and hated how old and wise he sounded when he said things like that. She wants him to want more for himself than this, to rage against it, not resign himself to the destiny of pining after someone as cold and scarred as her.)_

They did not speak again. They lay, faces, legs, chests, arms, ankles, feet pointed apart, fingers intertwined. She can hear the falter in his breath, see from the corner of her eye the stammering shake of his chest.

_(“What do you want?” He asks her that after she declares the North free, right after he kisses her for the first time, before she tells him that she’s in love with him, when Robb asks her to give away her hand—“Tell me what you want.”_

_She never asks him. Doesn’t want to know if it means she won’t be able to give it to him._

_He doesn’t ask now. Shouldn’t have to, she supposes. But her. She should. She should be able to say it now, like she had that first night, when he found her, so sad: “I want you, please, Tyrion, I want you.”_

_But she’s choking.)_

Too soon, they heard birds, morning birds, and she had to hurry away. She stopped before she reached the door and turned back, returned to his bed, leaned over him.

_(She loves his eyes, like windows they are, but today—)_

She kissed him again, held his face in her hands, brushed her thumbs along the prickle of his beard, and said, “Tyrion, I—”

“Please, don’t, Sansa, not today.”

_(“I will miss you,” she says finally, sounds girlish to her ears, now so used to defense plans and tax codes and laws. She does not want him to mistake her for a fool in love, but she cannot help that she cannot lie._

_Tyrion’s eyes are melancholy, “I will miss you, too.”_

_“You will be back,” she says, “Next year.”_

_So much can happen in a year._

_He says, “This is the way of a thing like this.”)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH NO! Guys, this chapter made me SO SAD. :( 
> 
> It also fits in the theme of the last two chapters of undergoing, substantial rewrites about twenty-five seconds before posting. I live on the edge. 
> 
> Also now featuring: 
> 
> -Glover Rants--like TEDTalks but angry  
> -Sansa oN tHe eDgE   
> -Therapist!Jon  
> -My favorite angst trope: Breaking Up While Still in Love   
> -My second favorite angst trope: Tragic Goodbye Smut  
> -My third favorite angst trope: Many Mentions of Peter Dinklage's Sad Eyes  
> -Author's Notes written while a *little* tipsy
> 
> Thanks for reading! <3


	20. you told me once that this isn't all that there is

When Sansa returned to her chambers, she could not sleep and so she sat up with her sewing kit.

She unfurled her Lysene silk. Counted out her buttons. Began to measure.

\--

Tyrion watched her go. Fell into a dreamless sleep. Awoke again when the maids came in to light the braziers. Lay in bed for a while longer, considered the canopy, looked the way the sheets rumpled in the shape of her. Wondered if the maids could tell that someone as small as him could not make such a mess of the bed clothes on his own.

_(A memory: Two Unsullied soldiers are dragging Jaime away, about to toss him in a caged cart, and he is following, always following. They push him up into the cart and Tyrion is trying to reach through the bars to touch something of his brother while he still lives. Daenerys is descending, skirts swirling, Jon on her arm, Sansa is coming down as well, package in hand, Brienne is mounting her horse, wracked with sobs. They have only moments before Tyrion is shuffled into his litter with Varys and who knows when they will speak again, if at all. He turns to go when Jaime manages to grasp his hand with his remaining, manacled one._

_“Tyrion,” Jamie says, eyes wild, “Before you go—please, Tyrion, before—you need to know. She was no whore. I never bought her for you. That was a lie that Father commanded me to tell. Tysha was ... she was what she seemed to be. A crofter's daughter, chance met on the road.”)_

He fell back asleep.

\--

Robb found her in her chambers. She was surrounded by needles and pins and the paper where she had painstakingly traced the illumination. She had started to cut the silk with large silver scissors. It really was a gorgeous fabric, she almost regretted slicing across it like she was the first footsteps across a clean snowfall.

“What are you making?”

She did not look up, “New gown.”

“Ah, pretty.”

“Thank you,” she stood back to admire the straight cut she had made.

“I was thinking,” Robb said, his voice edging nervous, “that we would hold the election early in the morning. Then straight to court business.”

_(As she watches Arya twirl in the training yard, she plays with one of the strips of Lysene silk, it looked dull in the thin morning light, even with the oil. Jeyne says, “It does look best at high noon. I took it to the Great Hall yesterday, as you asked, directly after the midday meal, and it looked like Beric Dondarrion’s sword.”_

_She giggles and Sansa grins.)_

Sansa moved aside the scraps that she and Jeyne had tested, now speckled with oil, so she could roll a new length of cloth to cut, “I think noon would be better, then a large midday meal for all. The lords will want to celebrate.”

Robb nodded, “That is fine. You would preside over proceedings?”

“Jon, I should think, international support and all. He is neutral, still well-liked here, unlike the Lord Hand of the South.”

“I was thinking for continuity, you would want to.”

Sansa measured the hem, brow furrowed, “I don’t know if that will be necessary. I will be there, I’m not sure I have to sanction it.”

“If not, you will have to make a statement of formal abdication,” Robb said. _(Not a request.)_ She consulted her sketch.

“Do I?”

“To prevent any confusion as to who is in authority.”

She began to cut, her scissors sliding, fabric fluttering. _(Such a shame.)_ “I will make a statement.”

Robb smiled, tension in his shoulders eased, “Mother has been concerned that we are at odds.”

Sansa did not respond, concentrated on keeping her scissors even, Robb continued, “But I think we will make an excellent pair once this unpleasantness is through.”

Sansa stopped then, raised her face to look at his, “We will, won’t we?” Paused, “After the unpleasantness.”

\--

Tyrion awoke angry.

_(His bones hurt, they always ache, but today they feel sharp, too long a walk in the godswood yesterday, too awkward an angle in bed the night before. Back stretched, knees weak, ankles swollen. He hobbles today like his heart is manifesting itself in the slow, stiff way he moves. He does not go to the morning meal. Can’t move fast enough.)_

Tyrion met with Jon and Robb that day.

_(He watches the brothers and he just wants Jaime. Then, suddenly, like an arrow, Cersei. He misses his sister._

_When he had seen them, curled together, dead at the other’s hand, a terrible thought slices through the fog: He couldn’t even be a part of that. The pair of them had even kept their downfall secreted away, just beyond where he was allowed to tread._

_Then he wonders what is wrong with him that it has only ever been Jaime could love him for true.)_

When they end deliberations, Robb said casually to Jon, so untroubled that he does not even mind that Tyrion is still there, gathering his notes and ink pot, “Sansa wanted you to preside over the election.”

Jon seemed surprised, “Oh, alright.”

Robb clasped his shoulder, “We’ll speak on it, later, Lord Manderly is awaiting me.”

When Robb had left, Jon looked to Tyrion, “She’s going to eat him alive.”

Tyrion agreed, “Like a wolf.”

_(He thinks of her face, looming over his, pinked with exertion, the way her teeth sunk into his shoulder, the way she had shuddered, called him beautiful.)_

_(He wants a drink.)_

\--

Supper was pleasant enough.

_(No wine, though, he notes.)_

Tyrion sat with the Flints, who’s company he always had enjoyed. Lady Flint kept looking at him, though, like she knew what had happened in his bed the night before. He must have looked at her like he knew that she was the cause of what happened in his bed the night before.

_(He cannot look at Sansa, cannot, will not bear her pain too.)_

After supper, all of them disperse to their own nighttime haunts. He went to his chambers. Tried not to order a flagon of wine.

_(“Oh, just do it,” Cersei says. He only sees her sometimes, mostly alone, sometimes draped over Tywin’s shoulder. Never here before. Never at Winterfell.)_

He was about to heed her when Arya entered.

He looked up, “You should learn to knock.”

Arya shrugged. Instead, a blunt: “Are you and Sansa at odds?”

“No.”

“You seem at odds.”

“We are not, I assure you.”

_(He is so sick to death of Starks.)_

“Why aren’t you there then?”

Tyrion considered Arya, her hair pinned back utilitarianly, the sharp jut of her chin. She stood like a ship’s captain now, legs wide as if constantly balancing against rocking. He liked her, always had, since the moment he had seen her race in late to the receiving line at Winterfell, liked her even better when she had gutted the Night King, liked her best when he had seen her sit beside Sansa in Daenerys’s council chamber, eyes daring anyone to touch her sister.

He does not know how to phrase it. Stumbled a bit, “We are not—it is not prudent for us to see each other at the moment.”

“Is this part of your insistence on tragedy?”

_(She’s mocking him._

_He flashes, surges with anger. It is certainly not_ his _insistence._

_Duty is the death of love, he wants to tell her, but how could a woman like her understand that? A woman who dressed like that, who had built a ship to sail into the unknown, who had never bothered to conceal her relationship with Gendry Baratheon. Their idea of duty was not the same and he does not want to hear a lecture from her.)_

“It is the right move until your sister has won her crown.”

Arya shifted, “She won it a long time ago.”

“Your brother would seem to disagree.”

Arya’s lips pinched, looked like her mother when she did so, “Well, Robb will figure it out soon enough.”

“Indeed.”

Arya cocked her head, “She cannot be an easy woman to love.”

_(He’s always been fascinated by Arya and Sansa. They are as different as two people could be while still being built from the same materials: steel and snow and anger and love. He imagines it cannot be easy for Arya to love Sansa as she does. He thinks again of Cersei. Her shape does not appear.)_

“There you are mistaken,” was what he said, “she is altogether too easy to love. It’s the staying that is the challenge.”

_(He imagines Arya knows that all too well.)_

\--

Sansa did not sleep that night. Could not bear the thought of bed. The darkness suffocated her so as soon as she blew out the candles, she relit them. She could not focus, not on correspondence or her papers, not on a book, resorted to making a mess and spreading out the things to make her gown. She worked manically.

_(Petyr sits beside her, while she crouches on a stool, bent over a seam, he manages to sit proud, chews his mint leaves. He lists off the houses one by one, always didactic, always testing her:_

_“House Ironwood?”_

_“With us,” she responds, like she had in her septa’s lessons._

_“Good,” he responds, “House Cerwyn?”_

_On and on and on and on.)_

She considered going to bed but kept finding something wrong with her gown, some other thing to finish.

_(She feels like she is enduring. Allows the guilt over Robb, grief over Tyrion, anger with her mother and with Talisa, crash over her like breaching waves. She is enduring. Makes herself focus on the neatness of her stitching, on folding pleats, on shaping a train._

_“House Greenwood?”_

_“With us.”)_

When she heard a knocked, she half expected Tyrion. Or Arya.

It was Jon.

“Oh, good evening,” she said, straightened.

Jon looked sheepish, embarrassed, “How are you?”

She looked at him oddly, “Well.”

“Robb told me that you want me to preside over the election,” he said, leaning against her door frame.

“I do,” she said, “I do not think it would be appropriate for me to do so.”

“Because you’re planning on doing something at the election ceremony,” Jon finished.

She considered lying, could not do it, and so nodded, “I will not hurt him, but I will not let him do this to me. To us.”

“I know, Sans, I know.”

_(Her body suddenly feels very old and very sad. Jon’s eyes, Ned’s eyes, are so kind—)_

“He wants my crown, Jon. He wants everything that I am—”

_(She’s balancing on the edge of something. Too terrified to freefall, pulls back at the last minute, trembles with the effort.)_

“He wants me to marry a prince in Dorne. Send me away from all that I have built and into another stranger’s bed—” brushed away tears yet to fall, “—I cannot do that.”

“Have you told him about what happened?”

_(Jon never can use her jailers’ names. Joffrey, Ramsay, Petyr, Lysa, Cersei, Tyrion, Tywin, Daenerys.)_

“I can’t—” she broke off.

_(How can she describe the inexhaustible weight she feels when she thinks about trying to begin to explain Ramsay and Joffrey and Petyr and all the ways she’s been used?_

_How does she explain each scar? There’s too many to count.)_

So, she said: “It’s just too much, Jon.”

“Do you want me to speak with him?” Jon asked, quiet, skirting dangerous.

_(She has an image of Jon atop Ramsay, pounding him into the dirt, pictures Robb on top, Robb beneath him. She sees Petyr backed against a crypt wall; Jon’s fingers curved about his tender throat. She sees Jon, in their solar, eyes sad and wide as she tells him what he must do to Daenerys. He is always so good.)_

“No, Jon, it will be alright. Let me do this. I will not hurt him, I promise.”

Jon hesitated, “Sansa, he would listen—”

“It’s not your responsibility.”

“You _are_ my responsibility, Sansa.”

_(It would be so easy to have him go for her. He would do it correctly. Could get Robb to understand, could force him to understand—_

_She looks at her gown, the spread of fabric, her needles shimmering in the candlelight like miniature swords. No. She had made a choice. She must do this herself.)_

“No. Jon, I will handle it.” A finality.

Jon looked unhappy but nodded. _(He will always do her bidding.)_

He made to go but remembered something, turned back, “You and Tyrion…” he trailed off.

_(That scar is too fresh, still gapes and bleeds.)_

_(Ice slides into place, cages and conceals and comforts her.)_

_(Cannot deal with this. She must finish this gown, prepare for her meetings tomorrow, answer the correspondence she did not finish today. Giving up Tyrion was supposed to stop the questions. Let her be.)_

“Did he tell you?” She pressed her fingers into her temples. _(She’s addled from lack of sleep, that is all.)_

“No, he told Arya.” _(_ Fuck _Arya. And Tyrion. Both of them.)_

“And she sent you?”

“Sansa, I know what it is like—”

_(She flashes with rage. He knows what it’s like to do the precise opposite. He knows what it’s like to love until you’re blind, until your country is an offering on a platter, until your love and your honor is pierced and dead and flown away.)_

“Jon, I have much to do.”

“Sansa—”

“Jon.” _(She makes her eyes wide and hurt. It’s not that hard. It’s not even a lie.)_ “Not tonight.”

Jon inclined his head, “If you wish.” _(He would always do her bidding.)_

“I do.”

He left.

\--

_(Petyr raised his eyebrows, “Now that that’s done, House Amber?”_

_“With us, no, against us. Well, the youngest son is for us, but the elder said to the one of the Dormunds that he had misgivings about the succession and that he liked Robb.”_

_“Who votes?” Petyr hissed._

_Sighed, “The elder.”_

_“Get it right the first time, sweetling.” Warning, “Try again, House Amber?”)_

\--

Arya stayed with Tyrion. Only left briefly to order him tea. Told him she saw Jon on the way to the kitchens. Told him one of her adventures. She was trying to comfort him, he could see.

_(The way she watches him reminds him of Sansa when she runs—ran—her hands over his sore limbs._

_The way she speaks to him, lightly, kindly, reminds him of Jaime.)_

Arya only left when he began to doze. And he was grateful.

\--

Sansa finished the last stitch of the gown in time to go see Arya train in the early pre-dawn. It had been a simple design, not particularly difficult, but still she had worked fast. One long, single night. Lying on the table, it looked plain, empty, imperfect but Jeyne exclaimed when she saw it, “Oh, _Your Grace_.”

She looked down at her hands, reddened and swollen with labor. Clenched and released.

It was done.

Sat heavily on her stool.

And that was when she began to weep.

\--

_(After Jeyne leaves, she is suddenly awash in anger. Tightens her fists, growls, gnashes her teeth, like a terrible monster from Old Nan’s stories. Sends her sewing kit spinning across the room. Pounds the table with primal strength, twists and rips her sketch. Breaks her quill so the ink leaks and dribbles all across her table._

_She wishes she had a dragon. How good_ that _must feel, she thinks, as she bends her pins into unnatural shapes._

_Looks at her gown, hanging lifeless on its form, snarls at it, too. Looks at the sleeves, long and trailing, pulls them. Takes her scissors and slices them away. Snips away the buttons and cuts away the seam at the back, so it hangs open like flaps of skin, an untreated wound._

_Looking at the pool of fabric at her feet, her anger dissipates as soon as it arrived. Takes a little piece of her with it.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I project on Sansa all the time. But never more than when she stress-crafts. ;) (I also know nothing about sewing, I have a close friend who's a textile expert and she's so ashamed of this chapter. :D) 
> 
> Also, as one of my final S8 fix-its, JAIME TELLS TYRION ABOUT TYSHA. Dammit. This is the hill I will die on. 
> 
> There was some discussion (okay, like one comment, but still) about seeing stuff from Robb's POV. I have a bunch of stuff written from Robb's/Catelyn's POV that I cut because I realized I really wanted to focus on studying Sansa and they got in the way (it's a theme)--would people like to see that as like a one-shot or bonus chapter?? Let me know! 
> 
> Thanks, as well, for the comments/kudos/continuing to read this weird story... :)


	21. are you tired of them falling like crumbs on your lap

The next morning found Sansa and Jeyne watching Jon and Arya spar. There was a circle of young squires about them, interspersed with green wildlings, all eager for a glimpse of the two warriors facing off.

_(Jon had come to her room that morning, “Come with me, Sansa. Please.”)_

Arya had started the session with her usual sword dancing. It looked strange to the youths who sniggered amongst themselves. Ever since she had started to watch Arya train, almost seven years ago, she found this part strangely beautiful, enchanting even—the flow, the strength, the way Arya moved with breath, like water.

_(Arya trains at dawn without fail and Sansa is awake frequently enough at that hour that when Arya is home, she finds often that she is at the training yard, watching, just the two of them.)_

_(She feels so untethered today. The training yard has been the only place she has seen Arya since the argument with their mother, she has not seen Tyrion for nearly four days and she is sure that is with intention. She feels as if two of her great pillars have been knocked out under her, that she is left balancing between Jon and Jeyne. It is not quite enough.)_

“Come on, Jon,” Arya called when she spotted Jon beginning his own routine. She had started later today in deference to Jon but still had managed to get in almost a full hour of work before the wildlings even began to drift into the yard. Her brow glistened with sweat, her braid frayed. Arya swung her sword in a complicated series of wheels. It made Sansa dizzy. Jon stood back, watching, smile on his face. When she was done, he engaged, swords clanging, parried, thrust, she leapt over it. They circled each other:

“Is that all you have, King Beyond the Wall?”

Jon laughed, “I’m just warming up, Lady Arya.”

That annoyed Arya enough for her to thrust and Jon knocked it out of the way, “You’re spending too much time on ships, Arry.”

Arya moved suddenly, managed to slash a hole in Jon’s shirt, “And you’ve been spending too much time in bed.”

Sansa felt her mother before she saw her, smelled the lilac oil that she still, years later, used. Catelyn sat next to her. Catelyn spoke not a word and so neither did Sansa.

Arya and Jon had not noticed them yet, intent on each other, swords pointed. Jon lunged and Arya actually flipped backwards, sword still in hand, acrobatic. It garnered a cheer from the growing crowd.

“Now, you’re just showing off,” Jon complained good naturedly, but he still swung his sword at an angle, causing Arya to have to jump. Catelyn gasped and Sansa had to bite back a smirk.

Arya twirled, braid flying, caught the edge of Jon’s shirt, he wrenched back, tripped and fell. Not down for long, turned on his belly and cut his sword under her, using her surprise to give him a moment to stand again, attacking without pause, forcing her to retreat slightly.

“She reminds me of your uncle Brandon,” Catelyn said quietly, “He was an extraordinary fighter.”

_(Petyr is sitting next to her, as always, she can tell he is rolling his eyes, fingering the scar under his clothes, the way he did sometimes when they were alone, when he was telling her things about her parents’ past that she’d rather not know._

_“You’re surprisingly calm about her return,” she says to him in her head, “Your great love.”_

_“Don’t make this about me, sweetling, I’m not even real.”)_

Arya lunged, nicked Jon on the hand, and at his gasp, laughed. Catelyn sighed, “They are still the same after all these years.”

“They _are_ brother and sister,” Sansa reminded.

“Indeed. I was not a very good mother to him either, I fear,” Catelyn said, “I thought of that often after Robb had Little Ned. If all our troubles were caused by my cruelty to a little boy that I just could not love.”

_(“Has she said anything to you?” Sansa asks Jon, after dinner, “If she has been rude to you or unkind—”_

_“I think she’s mostly pretending that I’m not here,” Jon says._

_“Jon, you are a king and a Stark, you deserve all of her respect.”_

_“Trust me, Sansa, this suits me just fine. You and Arya and Robb, that’s enough.”)_

Sansa did not know how to respond. So, she didn’t.

 _(“They_ still _don’t know,” Petyr says, shaking his head, unbelieving.)_

She watched Jon and Arya orbit each other a few more times, each too cautious to move, until Arya surged forward, in a blindingly quick series of taps and parries.

“We should have come back sooner. Or sent word,” Catelyn said, “We, well your father and I, should have done a lot, I fear, before any of this started. It is an impulse for those who have known war and pain to want to protect your children from it. And so, we raised summer children, nursed you with stories. Robb did the same with Ned, of course.”

“It is natural, to want to protect the ones you love,” Not unkind.

“Does that mean what I did to you and Arya is unnatural?”

Arya had seen them by now, eyebrows raised at Sansa, when she turned to surprise Jon with a blow, it was sharp and heavy and bruising, Jon yelped, “Gods, Arya, we’re just sparring, don’t _actually_ kill me.”

The cruel part of her wanted to let that hang there, dangle it before her mother, let Catelyn chase her own conclusions. She could not quite forgive, not yet, but she offered, “You sent Brienne after us.”

It sounded lame even to her own ears.

“Aye.”

Silence fell between them.

“I know that you are unhappy with Robb, that you will make it difficult for him to find his place again,” Catelyn’s eyes stayed on Arya, leaping now to balance atop the fencing that bound in the training yard, making Jon chase her about, “I will not interfere, I will not try and influence which one of you comes out on top, I will not tell Robb about you and your mistakes and I will not tell you about his. But I will not see this family ripped apart. When this is over, whatever _this_ is, and it _will_ end even if I have to lock you two in a room like you were children, you will both move on.”

“How did you—”

“I am still your mother, Sansa, no matter my errors, and a mother always knows.”

Sansa pursed her lips, looked to the sky, “Arya said the same thing. About our house.”

Catelyn’s smile was small, brief, a flicker, “Well, she is still a Stark, no matter what strange profession she has picked.”

Arya spun, pinned Jon, and the crowd cheered her again, “Bringer of the Dawn! Bringer of the Dawn!”

\--

_(When she cannot sleep two days later, she goes to watch Arya train and she is surprised to see her mother already there, alone, eyes ringed with bruised shadows, watching Arya twirl and kick in the blue morning light._

_They do not speak. But she finds her there the day after that, too._

_When she goes to ready herself for the day, Catelyn enters, brushes her hair, tells her that she needs to order more wine if they are to host the whole North in a fortnight. Sansa agrees.)_

**\--**

As soon as the call for an election went out, lords began to arrive from across the kingdom, even those who had not managed to come for the initial announcement of the Stark return.

She and Robb spent their mornings in the courtyard, greeting the stream of Northern lords and their families, flanked by their council, Lord Manderly offering booming greetings and introductions, Lady Flint whispering subtle invitations to dine to noble wives as she kissed their cheeks, Lord Glover looking seriously at the husbands, “We have much to discuss.”

**\--**

The next ten days passed quickly:

“It’s the Forresters, I worry about,” Lady Flint said, “All the games with their lumber.”

“Aye, me too,” Glover said, “The Brownbarrows, sheep-rearing house. They rely on exports to the South. Lord Tyrion makes them nervous.”

Sansa chewed her lip, “We need to make Lord Manderly’s plans untenable. Lady Flint, you know Lady Brownbarrow?”

“A little.”

“Remind her of why Jon is here. The trade expansion into the North.”

Lady Flint made a note. Sansa paused, sucked in a breath, “We’ve made a mistake.”

Lady Flint’s head snapped up, “Your Grace?”

“What about the new houses? The ones created after the war?”

 _(“The ones_ we _created after the war,” Petyr says haughtily._

 _“The ones_ I _created,” Sansa replies._

_“Of course, sweetling.”)_

“With us, we should hope,” Lady Flint said, “Though the Larks have been making noises that they, perhaps, they would prefer a ruler with an heir. And the Riggs as well, though they were merchants—”

“And Manderly sponsored their incorporation. Rigg was at that dinner party as well,” Sansa glanced down the list, “Rigg will be tricky, he will need be handled delicately. He’s coming to court next week to speak on the Southern trade proposal. He’s yours, Lord Glover, make him fear cutting off the South. Under no circumstances, though, must he know about our part in the election. Put him in touch with Brownbarrows and the Forresters, if need be, give them the same reports that we gave Lord Tyrion—what was it? Five years ago?—about what would happen if we were to stop trading with the South. As for the Larks,” she tapped the table, considered the ceiling, “Tell them.”

“Tell them?” Lady Flint was surprised.

“We need the new houses; we need to make them feel included. The Larks are inland enough, do not trade enough to have a relationship with Manderly or to feel threatened by the importation taxes. Robb has met with all the old large houses, his friends from childhood or people that Father knew well. The ones that Manderly would have a relationship with,” she counted down the list, “We have many more small, new houses. They are our new nobility,” A spark, “We are the future of the North, Robb and Manderly are the past,” chewed the words a bit then nodded, “Yes, that sounds good. Tell them, make them a part of the process, the Gods know we will need them to keep the peace when this is done.”

\--

A week before the election:

“The Prince has ingratiated himself quite thoroughly with the Harclays and the Tuttles,” Lord Glover said, jamming the nub of his pen into the table in frustration. The quill split, blooming ink across his parchment.

Both were houses headed by the youngest of lords, men who had been children during the Battle of the Dawn.

“Wasn’t Lord Harclay’s uncle killed by the Boltons?” Lady Flint asked.

“And thus, paved the way for young Lord Harclay to inherit,” Sansa sighed, “The Tuttle boy? He’s inherited in just the past year. I have yet to see him at court.”

“Against the South. A little warmonger, that one,” Lady Flint said, shaking her head, “All these green boys, reared in peace.”

_(Like her and Robb.)_

And so, they went on.

\--

Lord Glover took the men hunting, paid impromptu visits to their estates, casually brought up how the Prince had tried to charge the Tallharts nearly fifty more bushels in their annual tithe that year and how subtly Queen Sansa had readjusted the price.

Lord Flint and his son met lordlings by practiced chance in Winter Town, happened to mention the Long Night, “Were you there? You must have been a child. Do you remember?” Lord Flint asked, with no shortage of drama, “My memory is mostly of Queen Sansa, knife in her hand, stabbing at the dead. Real warrior, that woman.”

“Doesn’t even know what craven means,” his son agreed, “Father, tell the story of how she killed Petyr Baelish.”

Lady Flint hosted teas for wives and daughters, dropped mention that a Dornish prince was looking for a Northern bride, if only the Prince were not so intent on marrying off his beautiful sister.

And Sansa continued. She stayed away from Tyrion’s door and the library at night, wrote letters instead. She sat with crofters, merchants, maids, stable boys at meals. She heard petitions. She remembered her courtesies.

**\--**

The council chambers were stifling. It was an unseasonably warm day, but the maids had stoked the fires to their highest. Lord Manderly was sweating through his robes, periodically patting his damp forehead with a borrowed handkerchief. Sansa was uncomfortable, too, her gown sticking to her body, her hair curling and frizzing. Even Jon, in deference to the heat, had shed his thick wildling furs and sat, collar undone.

“So, to review,” Lord Manderly continued, “we will have the Prince’s speech, then the tally overseen by King Jon. The crown will be on a cushion on the table and we will end with the Queen, now Princess, placing the crown on King Robb’s head and leading the call for the King in the North.”

Robb glanced to Sansa, “Is that really necessary?”

“Oh, I think it’s a _lovely_ image,” Lady Flint said, “Family unity and all that.”

Lord Glover could barely hide his grin in his cup of ale. _(Petyr rolls his eyes.)_

“Now, as to the day after,” Lord Manderly said, wiping away a bead of sweat from the tip of his nose, “we will have council as usual. Top of the agenda is the refortification of the Southern border.”

This time, Glover could not conceal his scoff.

Manderly ignored him, “I am sending the ravens to announce the Prince’s ascension tonight. By this time next week, it will be fully armed and ready. Now, our main priority is ending the annual southern conference to our benefit,” a look to Jon, “our mutual benefit, of course, Your Grace, you understand.”

Jon inclined his head.

“The second priority is the Princess Sansa’s marriage.”

She rolled her shoulders, but she could see Jon sit up straighter, lean forward, hands clasped.

“I have already sent our acceptance to the Dornish court. We should hear—”

“You already sent a raven?” Jon asked lowly.

Lord Manderly looked surprised, “Yes, Your Grace, three days ago.”

Jon ignored him, looked to Robb, “You’re not on the throne yet, Robb.”

Robb smiled, “Jon, if we are to get ahead of the Southron importation agreements, we will need to move quickly.”

Jon’s jaw clenched. Sansa was too far away to comfort him, to lay a hand on his, “Did you even consult her before you sent the message?”

Robb was sat next to Sansa, placed a hand on her knee, felt too heavy in this temperature, “She knew that this was happening.”

“Has she given consent?” The flush in Jon’s cheeks were nothing to do with the heat.

“Jon—”

“She’s our sister, Robb,” Jon said, “Our bloody sister.”

“And I am the king. We all have made sacrifices, Jon, you know that. I do not wish to send her across the continent. _Of course_ , I don’t, but I will not let sentimentality blind me again. I know what mistakes I have made; know the restitutions I must pay. Keeping us independent is a _part_ of that and making alliances is a part of _that_. We need to start asserting ourselves in the South, independent of Bran’s government—”

_(“That’s a good point,” Petyr said, leaning over her chair, breath in her ear, too hot, too close, “Young Wolf isn’t stupid.”)_

“You have no idea what you’re doing, Robb,” Jon spat, “You know nothing.”

“We can’t all live beyond the wall, freezing our cocks off.”

“And what do you know of honor? When you come here with your wife? Would you sell _her_ to the highest bidder, you oathbre—”

“You call me an oathbreaker? Bas—”

“Brothers!” Sansa said, “I appreciate both of your concern, but I am sat right here.”

“Sansa—”

“What would Father say?” she said, “Think of you two squabbling like this?”

Both had the good sense to look chastened. Robb spoke first, “Sansa, I am sorry if not asking you offended you, but—”

“I will do anything for my country, Robb,” she cannot lie.

_(Thinks of Tyrion. Thinks of her new gown, now hung in her chambers.)_

Robb looked to Jon, triumphant, was met with ice. She did reach awkwardly across the table to touch Jon’s elbow, does her best impression of Mother, “It will be alright, both of you, come now. What’s next, Lord Manderly?”

Jon squeezed the tips of her fingers, eyes solemn and sad, _I am sorry,_ they say. She gives him a small smile.

_(She appreciated Jon’s concern, truly she did, but he need not have worried. She had had Arya shoot down the raven with an arrow the moment it had flapped away.)_

\--

Sansa and Lady Flint were sitting in her solar, reviewing next day’s speech, when Lord Glover burst in, out of breath.

“The Forresters are with us, lumber pricing and all,” Lord Glover said excitedly.

Lady Flint pulled out their worn parchment, made a mark and then counted, “With the Graysons, the Whitehills—” More marks. She looked up, “Your Grace, we might just do it.”

\--

That night, she took her evening meal in her chambers. Jeyne came to collect her gown and told her that the household had retired for the evening. And then she told her about dinner.

Jon and Robb did not speak the entire meal, Jeyne said, until Jon called Robb a craven over the fish course. Catelyn had not aided the situation, took Robb’s side, speaking to Jon for the first time since his arrival, told him he was speaking to the next king. Thank the Gods, old and new, that Arya was not there. That might have fractured whatever fragile peace mother and daughter were building between them.

Where _was_ the Princess Arya, it had been wondered, the night before her brother’s election? What did it mean that she was seen in the yard, hauling about a bow, loosing arrows over her own skies?

Jon and Tormund Giantsbane had stormed out, spreading the conflict beyond the confines of the high table. And Talisa, the next Queen, she had disappeared as the fighting began.

What about Lord Tyrion? It depended on who spoke.

He sat back and watched the verbal melee. Some were saying that this was his doing, that he had brought Robb back to shame his wife, the Ice Maiden, break another Queen. Or, kindlier, to woo and win her back to his home.

Had the Imp already locked her up, chained her to his bed? Is that why Sansa, still Queen in the North another night, is that why she did not appear at the meal? No, others said, she and her brother always so close, she had been so kind to him. Did you see her conversation with Talisa in the gardens? The picture of sisterhood. Don’t be dramatic, it is only that she is tired, that she must rest before the events on the morrow. Big day tomorrow, probably bigger than her own coronation. Will there be lamprey pie at the feast, do you think?

“Well, that’s what the kitchen staff said, at least,” Jeyne concluded, careful folding the gown over her arm, “I’ll help dress you tomorrow. It will be challenging, I think, with the oil.”

“Thank you, Jeyne. Sleep awhile if you can.”

\--

She saw Jon on her way to the godswood. He was in the training yard, pounding into a sawdust bag with a practice sword.

“Jon,” she called softly.

He looked up, surprised to see her, “Oh. Hello.”

“I heard about dinner.”

Jon looked sheepish for a moment then firm, “I stand by what I said.”

“That Robb’s a craven?”

“Aye. He wouldn’t have sent that letter without your knowledge if he wasn’t afraid of you,” Jon said, focusing again on his target, swung again, hard, “It’s not right what he’s doing, Sansa.”

_(Finally. Someone has said it besides her.)_

“It will all be over tomorrow,” she said, leaned up against the fence bordering the training yard.

“Aye.” Jon practiced some cuts in the air, the wooden sword whistling.

“What would you have done if you were me?” she asked.

Jon paused, dragged the tip of the sword in the dirt, “Challenged him to a duel, probably,” shrugged, charged again at the bag, “But that’s why I’m not King in the North anymore.”

She laughed slightly. Watched him for a few more moments, then, quietly, “If you had to choose between Jarl and your crown, what would you do?”

He looked at her, “This is like being tested by Maester Luwin.”

“Sorry.”

He tapped the sawdust bag and then paused. Exhaled heavily, looked to the sky, carpeted with stars, “Gods, Sansa, I don’t know. I don’t like to think on it. Besides, being beyond the Wall isn’t the same as you kneelers.”

“But if you had to—”

“Duty is the death of love, Sansa,” he said, “And I have let love die enough for one lifetime.”

“So, Jarl, then?”

He picked back up his sword, twirled it by the hilt, “Again, that is why I am no longer King in the North.”

_(She sits with him a while longer before she carries on her way, watches him stab and parry his rage away. A failed king and a lonely queen.)_

\--

Tyrion could not sleep. He tossed, turned, read, then did not. Finally, he pulled on his trousers, a warm cloak and headed to the godswood.

The godswood was eerie any time of day, with its preternatural Northern stillness, but it had a special ghostliness at night, the pale branches of its trees snaked with night mists, scented with rotting leaves and ruptured earth. He treaded the paths carefully, aware of the echo of his boots, found himself with little knowledge of how, in front of the great heart tree—

“Tyrion?”

He started violently, fear battering in his chest, “Gods, Sansa, you cannot sneak up on a man like that.”

She appeared from the other side of the tree. She was dressed in black that evening, made her blur with the shadows, “I am sorry, my lord.”

_(Her skin is so pale that it looks like the moon itself, with its dips and hollows in shadows.)_

“You sound it,” he said, and she smiled.

She sat, right on the ground, leaned herself against the base of the tree, patted the space beside her. He hesitated, then joined her.

_(They sit next to each other. Not touching, no permission anymore. But he looks at her—the knife of her jaw, swan-throated. He’s served monsters and dragons and gods. But he has never served someone like her—self-created.)_

“Couldn’t sleep?” she asked.

“No. You?”

She shook her head, “It is tradition that a King of Winter sit in the godswood the night before his coronation. I did it the first time.”

_(He had heard. Legend was that she had communed with the spirit of her father and he had told her the future glories of the North. Bran had told him that she had mostly wept.)_

“Why is Robb not here?”

“Well, he’s already been crowned.”

“So have you.”

“Doesn’t feel like it, though, does it?” she said wearily, leaned her head back, closed her eyes, ribbed throat bobbed.

_(She really does have a beautiful neck.)_

“No, I imagine it doesn’t.”

She reached for his hand, he took it, kept in his lap, stroked the pads of his fingers over her knuckles. They sat there for a few moments, listening to the night sounds.

Then she said, whip-thin, “Sometimes, I wonder what would have happened if we stayed married.”

_(It’s an abrupt, unceremonious cruelty. She has not been this unkind to him in years._

_“I gave you a chance,” he wants to say. Doesn’t.)_

“Sansa, let’s not speak about it.”

“We will have to one day, why not now?”

_(First: Have to is a strong choice of phrase, he thinks, they’ve done just fine without have tos—)_

_(Then: It was a secret thing they had. The problem with secrets is that you never speak of them. How dare she try to now—)_

_(Finally: He_ likes _that Sansa is forward-facing, not like him, who is so toe-top full of specters he might as well_ be _one—)_

“It’s a useless thing to think, Sansa, we didn’t, and the world was probably better for it, in the end.”

_(He sounds angry and bitter and he supposes he is. Maybe Robb was right about him this whole time.)_

“Alright.” _(Gently, now, she thinks, senses the stakes.)_ “Not tonight, then.”

They sat for awhile longer.

“I am going to declare my intention to marry tomorrow.”

“Are you going to bait and switch the Dornish prince at the altar?”

“No,” she chuckled lightly, “I am going to marry the North. Like the Kings of Winter did.”

“And have the land make an honest woman of you?”

She laughed again. It cut the night. “Something like that.”

_(It is so ridiculous that he feels jealous of an entire country but there it is.)_

Silence again. A bird shrieked somewhere, kept shrieking, and she turned to him, unprompted, “Do you think Bran watches when we, you know—”

“When we fuck?”

She nodded, blushing. _(He can see it even in the dark. Well, can’t see it, just knows it. Adorable.)_

“Probably. Your brother’s a pervert,” he smiled at her and she covered her mouth to hide her smile, looked to the sky, like Bran might wheel above them.

She leaned her head against his shoulder, had to duck down at an awkward angle, he brushed the top of her hair with his lips, and found he wanted to be kind to her after all, told her, “I think we could have been happy. In the end.”

“Me, too,” soft, reedy, “In the end.” Trembling sigh. Broke her hand from his to pat her cheeks, “You’re right, this is useless.”

_(He is so very angry with her; understands he has no right._

_“I love you. I am in love with you. I love you,” she had said. Then right after, the part he forgets, does not give her enough credit for:_

_“I am so, so sorry.”)_

More night sounds: rustle of leaves, the scamper of something small in the festering undergrowth, that bird cry.

“What if I lose, Tyrion?” she asked.

“You’re not going to lose.” Shook his head at her like she was being silly, like a child afraid of the dark.

“But what if I do?”

“You’re not,” took back her hand, “This is useless, too.”

He knew that he was cutting her off, that she felt compelled to race down each road, to plan for every contingency—

_(The first time they have sex, she is sad, she is wondering if her mother and brother and father would hate her, she says:_

_“I don’t remember what my father even looked like. All I can remember is his horrible head,” shudders into quiet._

_“I still see Petyr sometimes,” she says finally, fearfully, like he might condemn her, call her mad, like they had done to Dany, “He speaks to me, tells me what to do.”_

_“I see Cersei. And my father,” he says in return. Fingers fleeting on the apple of her cheek, she leans into them, makes them stay._

_“I don’t see him when we’re together.”_

_He has no answer to that, how lovely, how sweet, kisses her instead.)_

Her frustration curled about her, tenses her muscles, clamped around his hand, when she spoke, it was raw, “If I cannot be queen, I think I will die,” _(He forgets how young she is, how inexhaustible the rest of her life must seem.)_ “What else is there for me? The idea of marriage—” she could not finish, shook her head instead, “I am terrified to lose children we don’t even have. This is the only, _only_ thing that I can do, the only thing I am good at. And to lose it?” Jaw worked like she was biting the words, breaking them between her teeth, “It would make everything that happened so meaningless.”

 _(In another’s mouth, it would sound starving and desperate, but it is Sansa and she’s just so_ good _._

_Then he thinks: Wouldn’t Robb say the exact same if any of them had dared to ask him why?)_

He took her hand, eyes on hers, kissed it.

_(I’ll stay with you. Stay with me. Whatever happens, just stay.)_

They leaned back against the tree and waited together for the spread of the sun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *whispers* part one of the election's next chapter. *scurries away*


	22. all things wind up but they always unravel

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> election (part one)

_(There is a lot that Sansa gets wrong when it comes to the Dragon Queen. The first is Sansa had given her a chance. Tyrion knew the look in her eye, the moment that they had rolled into Winterfell, it was a look that he had seen from her before, walking down the aisle on Joffrey’s arm.)_

\--

If one thing could be said in Lord Manderly’s favor, it was that he knew how to put together a celebration. The rafters were hung with the banners of every Northern house represented at the election, their edges drifting and curling in the draft. The throne, usually isolated on the plain dais, was now canopied in grey and white silks, the ones that were only hung on festival days. The hall was crowded, the lower gallery lined with chairs, all occupied by the stony-faced heads of the Northern houses: the electors. Tyrion sat above in the upper gallery, on the hard benches, between merchants and the lesser members of the houses. The hall hummed and Tyrion watched the way the lords and ladies below bent their heads together, ringed each other with whispers, ‘Who would have thought we would be here, again, so soon?’

The flutter of anticipation beat in his belly. Then the doors opened.

\--

_(Tyrion has always been able to recognize when Sansa was performing. Well, almost always. He knew it now. How she flaunted the love of her people before Daenerys, sat too close to Jon at supper, gave Tyrion a kind word, embraced Theon, stood with Arya. How she made a show in every council meeting of thinking over what she was going to say, leaning to consult with Brienne or Bran before speaking._ I have a pack and you do not. _She’s not playing the little bird anymore._

_She knew she was pushing, pushing Daenerys, pushing Jon, pushing him and Varys and everyone, to make a choice._

_Me or her. War or peace.)_

\--

Lord Manderly had meticulously arranged the processional. The council members first, two by two. Lord Manderly with Lord Glover, first, then Lady Flint and Jeyne. They would flank the ends of the council’s table to the left of the dais. Jon would follow, on his own, to take his place in their center, the silver crown already pillowed before him. Then the royal family, led by Sansa, would follow and take their seats amongst the other heads of house. Robb would go, crownless for now, stand before his people, near the center, so all could hear.

Lord Manderly shuffled amongst them, “Lady Catelyn, next to Queen Talisa, please, very good. Where is Lady Poole?”

“Where are they?” Robb hissed to Jon; first words exchanged since the night before.

Jon stared blankly at him, “I do not know, brother.”

\--

_(Sansa walks the earth believing that she had never won over Jon. That it had been Tyrion who had done it, finally made him see what Daenerys was and what could be._

_Tyrion lets her give him the victory because he is not a good man._

_But truly, what had shifted Jon’s eyes, his heart, his hand, was when Tyrion said, “Think on Sansa. Daenerys would see her dead, your house—your true house—burnt. And Sansa—she could do something real, Jon, something real and good. Sansa does not deserve a kingdom of ash.”)_

\--

Catelyn frowned at Arya, craned her neck, “Arya, where is your sister? We are keeping the lords waiting.”

“She’s probably dithering over her dress, Mother,” Arya rolled her eyes, “You know how she is; she and Jeyne are doing their hair.”

\--

_(When Sansa sits as one of the electors for her brother, she wears an armored bodice made of actual metal. The Warrior, come to slice the North from the Seven Kingdoms if she must. When he comments on it later, she puckers her lips, like she doesn’t know she’d just swapped the captive little bird and the defiant wolf for a new part to play, complete with new costumes and new lines.)_

\--

“Perfection,” Jeyne said, as she tugged on the skirt, “Turn around, Your Grace, let me just—” tugged again, “I like what you have done with it.”

The silk felt strange against her skin, the air cold on her shoulder, the oil slippery against her thighs. She turned again to examine the slice of her naked back in the mirror. No one but Tyrion and Jeyne had seen it in years, “Me too. It fits well.”

Jeyne nodded.

“Go on, Jeyne, they’re missing you by now,” Sansa said, “I have time, I just need to brush my hair.”

\--

_(He figures it out later:_

_He knows that the rumors of Jon’s parentage, the ones that get those first four men killed by the side of the road, have not come from him or Varys or Jon or Bran or Arya or Sam._

_That leaves one in their circle. One that cannot lie._

_Knows that they hurt Dany. That it is the whispers, the choice, that drives her mad as much as anything else.)_

\--

“Where is she?” Robb asked again.

Talisa hushed him, “She’ll be here, sweetling, don’t worry.”

Catelyn stared at Arya, grasped her wrist hard, spoke low, “Where is she, Arya?”

Arya stared back.

“Arya,” her mother warned. Looked to Jon’s hard face, staring straight ahead. Then to Flint and Glover bent together in whispers, “Arya, what is this? What is about to happen?”

Arya leaned into her ear, hissed, “Family, Duty, Honor, Mother. That’s all this is.”

\--

_(When Sansa rides into King’s Landing, she goes to Jon first._

_Then she comes to Tyrion. He remembers thinking, in a dazed sort of way, that it was good of her to do so. Tells her. Means it as diamonds, croaks it out like a toad._

_“Tyrion,” she said in response, for the first time reaches for his hand, kisses his knuckle, “I am so sorry about your brother.”_

_Sees no pity. Just kindness. Just kinship._

_And in that moment, he realizes that he loves her.)_

\--

Jeyne rushed in then, “The Queen is ill, my lords. She said to go on without her.”

“How will it look?” Lord Manderly dithered.

Robb was definitive, “We cannot keep them. Is she truly ill?”

“She was out walking in the godswood late last night, caught a chill.”

Robb seemed to consider, “A chill—surely she could—”

Jon put his hand onto Robb’s shoulder, like a ship’s boom, “Let her be, Robb, today is difficult as it is.”

They stared at each other. Robb confused, Jon firm.

Then Catelyn said, staring at Arya the whole time: “Robb, he is right. Let her be.”

Robb sighed, “Alright, let us go. We really cannot keep them waiting.”

Lord Manderly shook his head but took his place in line, signaled for the guards to swing open the doors. And it began.

\--

_(“How did you do it?” he asks her the first night they sit together in the library._

_“What?”_

_“Any of it,” he says._

_She actually seems to think on his words._

_“Petyr taught me,” she paused, “He lied. All the time. About everything, to everyone, including himself. And I never do. I don’t know how.”)_

\--

It was quite an impressive entrance that they made, Tyrion thought, elegantly executed. The council members in full regalia, Jon in black, Ghost beside him, the Starks in their new clothing, coordinated with their house colors. A perfect picture of family unit, despite that revealing display the night before.

The only hole, a gaping chasm: no Sansa. The crowd seemed to notice; words whispered shielded behind lifted hands. The council sat, Jon remained standing between them all, the Starks took their seats, the largest, most ornate chair, Sansa’s, left glaringly empty.

\--

_(The night after Bran is elected, Tyrion made Hand, Jon exiled, she declares the North will be free, the night after she has set Dorne and the Iron Islands on the scent of rebellion, leaving Tyrion a fractured kingdom before they have even begun, after she has told him that Brienne is carrying the future of his house, they have a drink._

_“What do you want?” He asks her, “What do you want for your people?”_

_She runs her finger around the rim of her goblet and her list tumbles from her, an unsteady ebb and flow, “I want peace, firstly, I want us to have a chance. I want to protect my women, the way I was not, I want us to produce things, our_ own _things, I want to make peace with the wildlings—”_

_She broke off, looked at him through her lashes, “You know what I really want?”_

_He’s so in love with her that he does not even speak, merely nods._

_“I want to extend the kingsroad west to east. Did you know if you live west of Barrowtown, the rest of the North becomes essentially inaccessible, even though the largest market town in the_ whole _kingdom is a mere ten leagues east?”_

_And it’s then that he knows, for once, that he made the right choice.)_

_\--_

“We have come here for the election of a new monarch to become Ruler of the North,” Jon’s voice rung out

_(So much promise, so much potential, to waste away at the edge of the world.)_

“I present your candidate, Robb, son of Eddard, of House Stark. We will hear his case, then take our vote.”

Jon sat.

_(He even sits like a fucking king, I could have made you king, I could have done it if you let me.)_

Robb rose, “My people, eight years ago, we sat together and drank together—”

This elicited a chortle.

“—and we declared our freedom. We declared ourselves free northmen! We were driven from our homeland, subjugated by traitors. I have felt this pain with you. But we have survived.”

Scattered thumping.

“We have survived, and we have prospered!”

Somebody cheered.

“I have come here to apologize. I have neglected my duty to you all, I have let others do the work that I should have done. But never doubt, that I have always loved the North, that I have always worked to come home to you, that it is the North that helped me to survive, the North that chased my thoughts and my dreams. I declared us independent and I will ensure we will remain that way.”

Another spattering of cheers and thumps.

“We are Northmen and we are free. We are a sovereign nation and we shall begin to act like it. No more pandering to Southern interests out of fear of reprisals. We have no need to bow to the South in fear. We will fight as we did before! We will fight for our ships, for our merchants, for our forests and lands to be safe!”

Talisa looked up, found Tyrion, and smiled apologetically. He shrugged in response. He had heard worse from Robb’s sisters.

“I have heard that fears that we will fall to civil war without a Stark heir, that without a consort, our kingdom will be short-lived. Well, trust me, my lords, we will not be long without a new little prince!”

Robb winked to the laughter of the crowd and Talisa blushed. _Was she with child?_

Seeing the question mark in Tyrion’s eyebrow, Talisa shook her head subtly, _Not yet. Soon. I hope._

“And so, this is my case to you, my people. I have erred. Let me make restitution. Let me serve you. Let me show you the North I see, the North my father would have wanted, the North we could be!” A smile, “I thank you, my people, for this chance.”

_Not bad,_ Tyrion thought, _short, elegant, kingly, effecti—_

Jon rose, “Here and now, I put out the call for any objection to the nomination of Robb, son of Eddard, of House Stark to be King in the North.”

There were murmurings, a few lords half-heartedly made to stand. Tyrion held his breath.

On cue, the doors at the end of the hall swung open.

\--

_(He remembers first seeing her as queen, that first visit, after pushing through thirty-foot snows, feeling so cold, so little compared to the vast, barren expanse of winter. She sat on her simple throne, wrapped in furs, crown pinned to her hair._

_Thank the Gods, we didn’t stay married, he thinks, sweet and bitter, how plain the world would have been without this.)_

\--

The hall turned, straining their necks to see who it was.

Several gasps, a few exclamations, the odd cheer.

Tyrion watched. Lord Glover actually laughed, loud and long, while Lady Flint merely tucked her hands into her sleeves, looked to her grinning lord husband. Lord Manderly gaped and Jeyne smiled.

Arya looked serious, watching, too, caught Tyrion’s glance and nodded: _Was it worth it for this?_

Talisa looked stunned; he could not see Catelyn, her face turned to Robb. Jon remained stone-bound and steady.

And Robb, Robb looked a million things at once.

\--

_(Three years ago: They are drinking, late at night, and Sansa is telling him a memory when she stops and says, “I think I loved Robb the best. I mean I loved all of them, and Bran was always so sweet but—”_

_He holds her hand, kisses it, she does not need to justify it. He had a brother that he loved too.)_

\--

Sansa stood in the doorway, her voice ringing out, bell-clear, “I have an objection.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *billie eilish's 'you should see me in a crown' intensifies* 
> 
> <3 <3 <3


	23. for the lady is risen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> election (part two)

_(“Help me break the wheel, Tyrion,” Daenerys had said, his almost queen._

_“Yes,” he had responded, breathless, almost in love with her.)_

\--

As long as he lived, Tyrion would never forget Sansa at this moment. She was a vision—the Mother, Maiden, and Warrior all bound up into one girl. Her hair cascaded flame down her back, bright, _virginal_. She is dressed in bridal white silk, that when it hits the light _glows,_ moonbeam bright. A gown that clung to her hips but that left her shoulders and arms bare to the cold, showing the serpentine network of roped silver scars that laced her skin. She descended into the hall, barefoot, no jewels, no crown. He had always thought her beautiful, but now she was _glorious._

The hall was silent as she glided towards the dais, the only sound the rasp of her skirt on the flagstones.

_(She has always gotten attention. She is used to that. But it has only been a few times in her life that she has felt like this, like the center of gravity, that all these men and women are her satellites.)_

She reached the long table, her voice ringing, “I would like to nominate myself, Sansa of House Stark, to be Queen in the North.”

The hall burst into whispers. Manderly made to get up, exchanging a look with Robb, “Your Grace, this is highly irregular—”

Sansa cocked her head, raised an eyebrow, and Lord Manderly fell silent.

Robb started quietly, “Sansa, what are you—”

Jon stood again, cutting him off, “Robb has said his case. You may say yours.”

Robb stepped back, awkward and unsure, looking to Catelyn, who cast her head down, then to Arya, who was looking past him at Sansa, then to Talisa, hands clutched in her skirts.

He sat in the chair intended for Sansa.

She locked eyes with her cousin and then with her brother, a thank you, an apology.

She turned, stepped into the shaft of noonday light that slanted across the center of the hall.

She was blinding.

 _(He so often thinks of her as Littlefinger’s creation. But this—this drama, this stage show, this remarkable piece of theatre. This, he thinks in awe, is all Margaery.)_

A breath. She began:

“I have heard the case for my brother. I have heard the case against me.”

She took two steps forward, by some magic, pulling the light with her.

“I have heard that I will not fight.”

At this, she turned her head slightly to Manderly, still gaping like a fish.

“I say I have fought. I have battled Lannisters, Boltons, Targaryens, the dead, for our freedom. I killed Ramsay Bolton to restore our home and when Petyr Baelish rent our lands from us, I slit his throat. I am resolved, in the midst and heat of the battle, to live and die amongst you all, for my kingdom and my people, my honor and my blood, even in the dust.”

It was silent but for her breath.

“To all who should dare to invade the borders of my realm, our realm, let it be known that I _myself_ will take up arms, I _myself_ will be your general, judge, and rewarder of every one of your virtues in the field.”

A slow, approving thumping came from the back gallery.

She continued, stronger, steadier, “I have heard that I will not marry. That is true. But only because I am already wed—The North is my husband and it shall be my only master. Like the Kings of Winter, I am bound to the land and it shall be my only consort.”

She pivoted, catching Tyrion’s gaze, her eyes are fierce, his are full of love.

_(His friends all mourn that he is attached to an unwinnable woman. He mourns it too. But what they have never understood is that he is in love with Sansa and she was never a prize.)_

Her voice rose, “I have heard that I fear. That my fear has led to concessions to our freedom. This I refute most vehemently. Let tyrants fear. The gods know that I have known many tyrants—Joffrey Baratheon, Cersei Lannister, Daenerys Targaryen. I know how fear erodes those who hold power and how it can isolate a queen from her people. “

Hands extended, “I have always placed my chief strength and safeguard in the loyal hearts and good-will of my people and no prince or king or queen has ever had more noble or worthy subjects.”

The thuds increased. Thunderous and deafening, like the pounding of an approaching khalasar.

Her hands pressed against her sternum, fingertips brushing against the rough beginnings of her scars: “I know that I have but the body of a girl, but I have the heart and stomach of my father and his father and his father who should have been kings! A King in the North!”

It was a monumental crescendo. Her words reverberate, kissing the ceiling, shaking the walls.

Cheers, applause, stomping.

Sansa waited for them to realize that she was not done, hands clasped before her. Slowly, slowly, the room quieted, and she took a breath to speak again. The hall, as one, had to lean forward, benches creaking, to hear her next words:

“It is not my desire to live or reign longer than my life and my reign shall be for your good. And though you have had, and may have, many mightier and wiser princes sitting in this seat, you never had, nor shall have, any that will love you better.”

Her eyes swept the hall.

Her people.

Her eyes fall last to Robb.

_(She has only felt like this once. On a rampart, a long time ago.)_

_\--_

_(He watches Jon and finally Jon looks back._

_“Alright,” he had said, in that cold dark cell, clutching Jaime’s knife, the part that Tyrion forgets, that he does not give him enough credit for, “For the kingdom.”)_

\--

Does it need to be said?

Sansa wins.

\--

Ale was poured out to Sansa’s health, and there’s impromptu jigs in the hall, and the northern lords emptied her larder, but eventually it faded and Sansa was left alone in her chambers, Tyrion by her side, staring into the fire.

The luminescence of her gown had faded, the oil Jeyne had painstakingly dipped it in to make it shine, dried and mottled where it collected slightly at the edge of her hem.

_(She cannot lie. All her schemes are just tricks of the light.)_

It was cold tonight especially after the hot joyous bubble of the Great Hall. Jeyne had wrapped a shawl around her bare shoulders, set aside her crown, and braided her hair before departing silently. Tyrion had joined her shortly, thereafter, carrying a pot of tea and two cups. She was too tired to say anything, and he sat, holding her hand. The hearth was throwing scarlet shadows and when they flicker across her stomach, they looked like bloodstains.

Tyrion, of course, had to break the silence, “That was some risk you took.”

She did not answer. Her eyes looked so exhausted, so world-weary.

_(His heart breaks. She’s only twenty-five.)_

She finally said, “I thought about what you said when Bran was elected. About stories. I figured mine was better.”

“What will Robb do now?”

She sighed. _(He always pushes her. All the time. She just wants to rest.)_ “Hand. I could give him a castle. Diplomat. I need him close, but I’ll let him choose.”

They fell back into silence. An hour passed, maybe minutes, maybe a year.

_(It hurts to move, she feels her bones creak, she wants to sleep, but she can’t, she has to keep going, going, going.)_

“Does this mean that this still has to end?” He croaked.

_(Is it hope? Is it fear? Is it love? Is it regret? Is it—)_

“Oh, Tyrion,” she exhaled.

 _(She cannot_ deal _with this. Her desires, his desires, are so infinitesimal to the whole of her country and her people. He_ knows _this. Why must he always push her? Why is his timing always so poor, always so tiring? Then another old aching thought. He won’t stay—)_

“I love you.”

_(She’s only said it once before.)_

_(It’s not yes, it’s not no, it’s not full of hope, it’s not full of regret, it’s just a weary, inconvenient truth.)_

He kissed her hand.

_(It’s not comfort, it’s not pity, it’s not even love, or kindness, or the myriad things he feels about her every day. It’s just what he does to get her to stay.)_

\--

_(The last marker is cast by House Venture, the newest of the Northern Houses. Jon says, “I present to you the Queen in the North!”_

_It feels like a cord she did not even realize was binding her chest is being snipped and she can take a breath again. She is_ breathing _again, pants and grins with the effort._

_The room explodes, wildfire bright, chants, cheers, she raises her arms above her head, like a blessing, radiates in the sinking afternoon light._

_When she turns, Robb is gone. Talisa is gone. Like will o’ the wisps._

_Catelyn, though, Catelyn she sees, hard-eyed, on the edge, caught in the crush of Northern lords and ladies, seething, surging for a look at their queen._

_Instead it is Jon who crowns her a second time. Hand heavy on her shoulder, pressing her knees to bruise into the flagstones. It is Lady Flint who reads out the ancient words, weds her to the land._

_The crown’s edge is sharper than she remembers.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The alternative title to this chapter was: Sansa wins in the half the time.  
> I am so, so nervous to post this...so nervous that I almost just tried to do it without text XD 
> 
> The election scene and the Sansa/Tyrion scene were the second and third things I wrote for this fic after the Sansa/Arya conversation in Chapter 3. And unlike the rest of this fic, they have barely changed in the past four months so I hope you enjoy. :) 
> 
> Also! Sansa's speech is spliced together (and then spiced with some Westerosi flava) from speeches and writings from Elizabeth I made between 1570-1590--with a special focus on the speech given in Tilbury, England, immediately before the Spanish Armada, one of England's most decisive and surprising naval victories. So if anyone's wondering about the Sansa is Elizabeth I tag...I take it...literally. ;-) 
> 
> Thank you for reading! <3


	24. i'll fight, but i find there's nothing here to resist

_(When the war was won, she finds out that it was Barbrey Dustin who had helped in her sale, who harbored the Bolton survivors, had sent her men to aid the Freys._

_She sniffed out where Lady Dustin hid. Dragged her before the court, looked her in the eye, and chopped her head off. Left it rolling in a constellation of blood in the snow. And then she ripped House Dustin out root and stem, tossed salt to ruin their lands, charred their holdings, threw their sigil into the flames._

_She mourns it. Mourns that it is not what her father or her brothers would do, mourns that she cannot think of what they would say to her if they knew. Is mourning it when Tyrion finds her, sad, in the library and when they have sex for the first time._

_It was the last time she would take revenge, she had told Tyrion, afterwards, leaning on his shoulder, the last time.)_

\--

She sent Tyrion away after a while. Then she sat at her desk to work. Unbelievably, in the last day, correspondence had still stacked up on her desk, in need of attention. She still had Tyrion’s absurd trade proposal to counter.

She worked until the blue pre-dawn. Just as the light began to warm and slip into gold, a raven landed on her window, shrieking. The note is short:

‘Congratulations.’

She laughed, in spite of herself.

Two hours later, Arya entered, “Robb wants to speak with you.”

_(She has been dreading this moment, dreading it since the very last tally.)_

She let Arya lead her to Robb’s rooms. Arya took her leave before Sansa entered, “I don’t think I’d be welcome.”

The chamber is messy, sheets pulled from the bed, a cup tipped over. Talisa was nowhere to be found. It was just Robb, swollen-eyed, angry Robb. Sansa became acutely aware that she was still wearing the gown she wore yesterday.

_(She’s feels like she’s slapping him, assaulting him with her image.)_

“Well, good morning, my queen,” Robb said.

_(She’s heard him angry, happy, sad, joyful, but never this. Never bitter. Never at her.)_

“Good morning, Robb.”

A silence settled, thick and oppressive, on the room. There was nothing to say except—

“Why?” Robb’s voice cracked.

_(Why what? There are a thousand whys: Why am I queen? Why did you leave? Why did you come back? Why did you leave me to die in the South? Why did we survive when so many didn’t? Why do you think that you should be king?)_

“I don’t understand what you mean.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“What? If I told you I wanted to stay queen, you would have just stepped aside? Let me continue to rule?”

“We could have worked something out,” Robb was quivering with the effort to stay sounding calm.

The words poured out of her quickly, “Could we? Until the Dornish offered you a trade deal, I suppose, or perhaps the Essosi. Robb, what would I have been to you? A marriage pawn? It never would have been enough, I would have always been under you, suffocating, waiting for your word—”

“You humiliated me! You humiliated me in front of our people!” Robb burst.

“I humiliated you?” Sansa gave a dry chuckle, anger washed through her, she burst back, “You humiliated me! You were not here two days when you declared that you would take my throne! What was I to do? Step aside and let you usurp me without cause except that you wanted it?”

“It was mine by rights, Sansa, you should have stepped aside.”

“You abdicated the throne when you left! We thought you dead!”

“I had no choice!”

“Perhaps not, Robb, but it happened. You left and Jon became king and then he left and so I became queen and all I have done is work to fix the mess you two made.”

“The mess? You mean declaring independence? I stood in front of our people and I promised to fight for the North. I lost men doing that. I lost my home doing that.”

Tore at her braid, “Stop! You do not have a monopoly on our house’s pain, Robb! I am sorry for your travails, Robb, truly I am, but they do not give you a right to anything. I love the North as much as you, it protected me and sheltered me when I had—”

Robb’s eyes hardened to grey cruelty, “You sound like him.”

The shift took her aback, “Like who?”

“Like the Imp.”

“Leave him out of this—”

“You speak so nobly of the North and yet you let the Lannister Imp between your legs.”

“Excuse me?”

“Talisa figured it out. You trail after each other like lost pups, you’re in love with him, aren’t you? He wants to marry you and get cubs on you. Congratulations, Sansa, you are completing Tywin Lannister’s legacy. Lions finally in the North. Not through conquest but through our noble queen’s bed,” he mocked.

_(She just about explodes hot, white, blinding anger. That’s rich, she wants to shout, when you gave up a war for what was between Talisa’s legs. But mostly she just wants to cry—Robb, her Robb, is calling her a whore—)_

She could not muster anything but: “That is unworthy of you, Robb.”

He seemed to regret it but continued, more gently, more injuriously, “I wandered the world, waiting and hoping to return. When I almost died, the North was what kept me sane. When I was borne away across the sea, it was the North that I dreamed of. When my child died, the North was what kept me going. This has been it for me for the past eight years!”

“And what do you think kept me alive? You never came for me. I waited and waited. You left me in Westeros at the mercy of our greatest enemies. I bet Jon left that out of his stories. How Joffrey stripped me and whipped me in front of all the court and how Petyr Baelish took me and sold me away to a monster. Did he tell you, Robb? Didn’t you see it? How Ramsay Bolton beat me and cut me and raped me? How he made Theon Greyjoy watch our wedding night—”

“Stop, Sansa.”

“Why did you think yourself so worthy of it? You’re the same as everyone else! All I have ever been to you and to Mother and to Father is a cyvasse piece to be bartered away, to be retrieved when convenient, and you were the ones who loved me best of all. I ran and I fought and I killed to escape what fates were given to me by others, what could have _possibly_ made you think that you usurping me would be any different? What _else_ do I have to do to prove I am worth more than that?”

Robb sighed and she felt it in her soul, “What you did was without honor.”

“Without honor, Robb, I—”

“You tricked—”

“Stop cutting me off!” She intended it to sound commanding, but it came out more of a shriek, gasped, “I can’t breathe when you do that.” 

Robb stared at her, silent.

“I am sorry that more of our people voted for me and thought me the better choice. But you have the choice now. You can stay and work with me or you can go. You and Talisa and any children you have will be provided for.”

She swept from the room.

\--

_(“They would have hated what I did,” she weeps into Tyrion’s neck, “They would not forgive this,” she searches for the word, “this_ slip _in honor.”_

_“You looked her in the eye when you sentenced her and when you swung the sword,” he murmurs._

_“But it was not justice,” she says wetly, “I did not do it for that.”_

_When he looks at her, all she sees is kindred eyes.)_

\--

She returned to her chamber. Someone had ordered a bath. She scrubbed away the grease of the oil, combed it from her hair. When she dressed for the afternoon, she chose her plainest dark blue wool gown, the one she wore for the rare days she had free to ride about the forests, she braided her hair herself, and then sat in her solar to work.

\--

_(“I am more Petyr’s now than Ned’s,” she says when he stops kissing her._

_He hushes her, “No, Sansa, you are your own.”_

_It’s that that makes her kiss him. Because she wants to see what he sees.)_

\--

The morning after the election, Tyrion awoke alone.

He met with Jon in the morning and learned precisely what Sansa was doing with lumber prices. Damn her.

On his way to confront her about it, he came across Talisa, pale, drawn, hurrying from her chambers.

“Princess Talisa,” he bowed his head.

She looked startled at the sight of him, but she softened, “Lord Tyrion, you are off to see the queen?”

_(What he wants to say: “Yes, damn her to all seven hells. And Bran, too, who must have known what she was doing this whole bloody time.”)_

He said: “Yes.”

_(What he wants to add: “I am so sorry, Talisa, about what she’s done.”)_

He added: “Lumber pricing.”

Talisa smiled and nodded, bent down and whispered, “Tell her that I said thank you.”

He nodded and she went on her way.

\--

_(“I like it,” she’ll tell him later, “I like being queen.”_

_He’ll draw his finger down her breastbone and say, “You’re good at it, dear.”_

_And he’ll mean it.)_

\--

There was no headier feeling than being newly crowned.

She spent the afternoon in her solar, receiving those who required favors and those who felt they owed an apology. One was Lord Manderly:

“Your Grace,” he had stuttered, “I truly thought I was supporting the next king, I had no idea that you intended to stay in power—”

“It is quite alright, Lord Manderly,” she said, “It should be noted, however, that your colleagues did not lack the imagination to think that perhaps there was an alternative to abdication.”

“Your Grace—”

“All is forgiven, you may go now, Lord Manderly.”

He bowed and hurried to the door.

_(Cat. Mouse.)_

“Though, Lord Manderly,” she caught him between her teeth just as he stepped out the door, “if I hear of any more of these supper parties being used as a way to air your defense plans, I may feel the urge,” she considered her words, “to _restructure_ the council.”

Lord Manderly nodded vigorously.

“And if I hear word that you are planning on using my brother in such a way as this again, I may feel a similar urge to,” she paused to take a sip of tea, savored it, “ _reconsider_ House Manderly’s value to our Northern cause.”

Lord Manderly blanched, “Understood, Your Grace.”

Sansa smiled warmly, did not reach her eyes, “Wonderful. I trust I shall see you at the next council meeting.”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

\--

Next is her mother.

\--

Catelyn sat primly at the end of the table, “So, that is what you were doing.”

Sansa had not felt this chastened since she was a child, she refused to bend, “It was fair. And legal.”

“You are right about it being legal. But fair?” Her mother’s eyes settled on her skin. Sansa broke her gaze.

“I have had to do what no other ruler has done before—be elected twice for one crown. So, you’re right, Mother, not fair.”

Cautioned look, “I didn’t mean that Sansa.”

Silence between them.

“And Lord Tyrion?”

_(Gods, she cannot even conceal the disdain. Disdain for what, Sansa cannot quite figure. For the man himself, the whoremongering Lannister Imp, born a kinslayer, cursed by the gods, or her, for lowering herself to open her legs for a man she did not intend to wed—supposes it does not matter truly.)_

“I married the North, Mother.”

“Good.”

_(“I love you,” she had said it again. Twice now._

_Surely, she should be able to tell her mother that._

_“I love him,” she should say, “I love him, and I had to let him go.” It would be easy, make her understand—_

_“Not yet,” Petyr cautions.)_

Her mother clasped her hand, “You will be good to Robb and Talisa, won’t you?”

_(She’s ruined this before it’s even started, frightened her own mother with the Ice Maiden of Winterfell. Who must her mother think she is now? Certainly not the daughter she had sent to King’s Landing._

_“You’re better, sweetling,” Petyr calls from the corner of the room.)_

“Of course, Mother,” shocked, hurt, pacified her for now.

“Alright, then. He will see sense eventually,” it was like Catelyn was refereeing over a lost doll rather than a kingdom, “I am proud of you, Sansa, truly. You will do good things as queen,” her mother’s voice was rough, like she was holding back tears.

Sansa looked down at her lap, one hand in her mother’s grasp, one twisted in her skirt, “Mother, I—"

_(I already have.)_

They were interrupted by Tyrion storming in, roaring, “Whale oil!”

“Good morrow, Lord Tyrion,” Sansa said, broke her hands away from her mother’s, pressed them to her face to cool her heated cheeks.

“Your brother just told me you’re trading for _whale oil_ with the Free Folk!” His face was red, and he shook his finger at her. Her attention was fully on him.

_(This is good. This she knows how to do; this she can control. Feels her slip into her own skin.)_

“I don’t see how that is your concern, Lord Hand.”

“My _concern_? All this reluctance to send us lumber because you needed it for fuel! Holding it over my head to negotiate the import tax! By the Seven, Sansa! Is that why Arya’s sneaking about and going North? _Whale oil!”_

“Do you have a counter proposal?”

Tyrion climbed into the chair, slammed his fist on the table, “I want in, Sansa! I want the lumber pricing back down to where it was, and I want whale oil!”

“You want a lot of things for someone who has yet to greet the Queen Mother.”

“Good morrow, Lady Catelyn,” he turned back to Sansa, “You thought I would not find out.”

“And you thought I would not find out about the docking tax.”

Lady Catelyn rose, “I think I will go.”

Sansa and Tyrion barely looked up, Sansa said, “See you at the feast, Mother.”

“Yes, good day, Lady Catelyn.”

Catelyn closed the door behind her firmly.

Tyrion gave what she supposed was intended to be a conciliatory smile but was really just a smirk, “Alright, we call it even. How much is he asking for it?”

She told him.

“That low? Even for Jon, that’s generous,” he paused, “Was that his first offer?”

“Second.”

“So, we can get him lower?”

“It won’t be fair—”

He reached for her hand, “Come on, Sansa, let’s work together. He has something we both want.”

She laughed at his eagerness, then considered as if this had not been her plan the whole time, “If I help you with whale oil, will you lower the docking taxes?”

He leaned in, cupped her face, “Oh, Your Grace, if you let me in on the whale oil, I’d set up a whole dock _just_ for Northern ships.”

She leaned in, brushed her nose against his, ghosted her lips along his ear, “That’s not taxes.”

He pulled back but he was grinning, “No, it’s not.”

“Well, I guess we still have things to discuss.”

\--

_(“You are a kind man,” she tells him quietly, slips a finger down the lightning strike that splits his face._

_She means it as affection, always._

_It’s then that he kisses her. Because he wants to see what she sees.)_

\--

That night there is a feast. Sansa looked like the Queen of Spring, sprigs of wildflowers in her hair, gown the color of marigolds. She sat at the center of the whirligig, sips at her cup.

_(This is a bit cruel, Tyrion admits to himself, no matter how marvelous it looks.)_

He left without comment and a flagon of wine.

_(Through the haze of activity, Sansa sees him take it. Fingers tighten around the arms of her chair._

_Petyr says, “Let him go, sweetling. He’s not yours anymore.”)_

He ended up in the royal chambers, standing outside of Robb’s door. He knocked and when he received no response, entered anyway.

Robb was awake and sat up, staring into the dying flames of the hearth, wrapped in a thick shawl. No Talisa to be found.

“My lord,” Tyrion said, closing the door.

“What are you doing here, Imp?” Robb said. _(Stark faces are not sculpted for acrimony.)_

“I believe I told you that already, about a decade ago. I have a fondness for cripples, bastards, and broken things. And you may not be crippled or a bastard, but you are certainly broken, Prince Robb.” He entered, sat in the chair he supposed was Talisa’s, opposite Robb, and set his two cups and a flagon of wine. He poured out two brimming cups and offered one to Robb. He did not take it. Shrugging, Tyrion downed it in two gulps, then refilled it.

“I thought we could play a game,” he went on, “One that I am exceptionally good at, my lord, so be warned. I guess a truth about you and if it is true, you drink, and if I am wrong, which I never am, I drink. Then you do the same to me. Got it?” Robb looked at him despondently, Tyrion chose to ignore it and set the cup on the stool in front of Robb, “Good, clever lad.”

He waited for Robb to hesitantly take the cup in hand, “I’ll start—”

“No, I will,” Robb said sharply, suddenly, “You knew she was plotting against me.”

Tyrion drank and wiping his mouth, said, “Well, to be technical, I guessed but—”

“You’re fucking her.” _(Stark tongues were not made for vulgarity.)_

“Is this from Talisa?” Robb’s hard-eyed glare was confirmation enough, but Tyrion did not drink, “Past tense. Was fucking her,” shrugged then drank anyway, wine burned like vinegar, “Still counts.”

Robb looked disgusted with him, “You are not deserving enough to kiss her boots, half man.”

“That’s probably true, Your Highness, but things, as you might imagine, are a bit more complicated than who deserves what. My turn—”

“Are you in love with her?”

Tyrion almost laughed, “What do you think?” but he drank anyway.

“Now,” he said, more firmly, “my turn,” he paused for dramatic effect, “you are relieved that you don’t have to be king.”

Robb did not drink. Tyrion paused, “Should I drink?”

Ground out, “I don’t know.”

“Ah, alright, you fought with Sansa this morning.”

Robb drank.

Tyrion hesitated, took a gulp of wine, swilled it a bit in his mouth, swallowed, “You are considering leaving Westeros again.”

Robb did drink this time. Tyrion saw his moment:

“You know when this all began; I wrote to my council asking what I should do, and they said I should sit back and let you two fight it out amongst yourself. The king, however, sent a note that said, ‘The lone wolf dies. You know what to do.’ Now, as is frequent with your brother, he forgot that I do not know what he is talking about most of the time. So, I have spent these past several weeks wondering, should I choose the person who would keep your house together? Should I try to isolate you from your family so Sansa could win? I don’t come from a very close family, see, and so it was quite—”

“Do you have a point, Imp?”

“I think I know what he means now. To go would be easy, Your Highness, to run back to Volantis and forget this whole mess. But your mother will not go with you this time. You’ll have no forgiveness from Arya or Sansa either. You will never see Jon again. Take some comfort that Bran will be watching you, but you will never meet in the flesh. Stay, atone for what you have done and what you have not.”

Robb scoffed, sipped at his wine, then said, “Thank you, Lord Tyrion, but forgive me if I do not take advice on family from a kinslayer.”

“Perhaps you should.” Tyrion said sharply, gentled, “I am saying this as someone who has made dreadful mistakes, ones that shook whole countries, that ended the lives of the people I loved most in the world. Your brother offered me my position because I needed to mend what I had undone. Sansa is not ungenerous. She will do the same.”

“Not ungenerous? She tricked me. Played me for a bloody fool.”

“Yes, well, if it’s any consolation, you’re in fine company. She’s tricked some of the greatest people this land has ever known,” he mock sighed, “I include myself in that, of course.”

Robb was in no mood for japing, so Tyrion turned serious, too, “She’ll never lie to you.”

“You are awfully generous with your advice for someone from a foreign kingdom.” Tyrion could hear the rebuke, the silent question.

Tyrion’s eyes glinted, narrowed, “I think you will find, Young Wolf, that it is all in our best interests if the South and the North are in agreement. I have limited interest in you beyond that,” he sipped his cup, “I also think you will find it is best if my interest in you remains limited. For your sake. And your sister’s. She cannot take much more heartbreak.”

He found that he had little to say after that and so after finishing his second cup, he made to go.

“Where are you going?”

Tyrion said, “To go see your sister about some whale oil. She’s generally more pliable after a feast. For what little it is worth, I rather liked your trade proposals. You were right, she is being unreasonable about these taxes.”

As he got to the door, Robb called out, “Lord Tyrion.”

“Yes, my lord?”

“You said past tense.”

“You heard her yesterday. She wed the North. I may be the Imp but to cuckhold the land itself seemed a bit extreme.”

“Does she love you back?”

Tyrion turned, eyes glittering, “I do believe she does, my lord.”

Robb swallowed, looked to the ceiling, “If you even think of betraying her or breaking her trust—”

“You’ll rain the power of the North on my head, my lord? Don’t worry yourself, Prince Robb, I would not even dream of it. Besides, my chambers in King’s Landing are right between Ser Brienne and King Bran’s, I would be drawn and quartered before you’d even crossed the border,” he laughed, “And you up here worry about Southern sympathizers.” He paused, “Besides, I said past tense, didn’t I?”

In the half-light, Tyrion’s shadow stretched across Robb’s lap and it almost looked like an embrace.

\--

_(Years later when she cannot sleep for visions of Lady Dustin, Tyrion will tell her: There is revenge, and then there is justice, and then there is survival._

_“I don’t want you to do something to Robb or Mother that you will regret,” Arya had told her._

_She will not avenge her honor against Robb, she decides, she meant what she said._

_The election is justice enough._

_Survival. That is all that is left._

_The pack must survive.)_

\--

Robb ignored her for two more days. Jon went to see him and Arya, too. She stayed in her solar, working. Tyrion hovered.

The morning before Jon is set to go, Catelyn was seen going to Robb’s rooms. There was shouting, silence, a clatter, more raised voices, and two hours later Catelyn emerged. Another hour passed, the servants scuttled by, wary of the closed door.

\--

_(“You were wrong,” Sansa tells Tyrion later, as she knocks one of his cyvasse pieces out of the way._

_“Hmmm,” he’s not paying her any mind, barely paying attention to the game, absorbed in a book._

_“Lovely Talisa wasn’t the key at all,” Sansa says, does not disguise her pleasure, “It was always Mother.”)_

\--

Then Talisa went to look for Jeyne, handed her a note for Sansa:

‘ _Hand to the Queen.’_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this fic is coming to an end and i am so strangely emotional about it.... :'''''''( 
> 
> Thank you to everyone for all the comments/kudos/bookmarks! This has been such a fun fic to work on!! <3 <3 <3 
> 
> FYI, there is a planned sequel. I am working on it now and it is slow going but I hope to have the first few chapters posted by September. Its progress is being powered solely by Taylor Swift's folklore album and white wine sangria so more of that and I should be done in no time. ;) 
> 
> Thanks for reading! <3


	25. epilogue

Robb emerged from his chambers the day after she sent a responding note accepting his proposal.

He came to her solar.

He did not look well but his face was clear. Stood before her desk. Does not meet her eyes, she cannot bear to search for his.

“Your scars, I should have asked,” he said, quietly, “Are they—”

“Ramsay Bolton was not a kind man,” she said, setting down her pen. Set her shoulders, feels the scars itch and catch on her small clothes.

“Will you tell me?”

She nodded, “Someday. Soon. Not today, I think.”

Robb accepted it, “Hand to the Queen.”

“Yes.”

Quiet again, “I assume whatever documents I have been receiving is not correct information.”

“No,” Paused, “I will have Jeyne compile what you need.”

He turned to go, went to the door, hesitated, turned back, “Sansa, the unpleasantness—”

“It’s over, Robb. We are family.”

Robb’s face creased, “Aye. I suppose we are.”

\--

_(He finds her in the library as he knew he would. Stands back, he reeks of wine. She is sat in the armchair, he stands, by the door, still in shadow. She has pulled the flowers in her hair are crushed and wrinkled, brown and fragrant between her fingertips. No more Queen of Spring, just a woman flushed from too much dancing._

_“Did you read my proposal on the whale oil?” he asks._

_She nods, “I’ll bring it to Jon on the morrow.”_

_“Good,” he turns to go._

_“Tyrion?” she calls._

_He pivots back to face her, “Sansa?”_

_“You’ve come from Robb.”_

_“Yes.”_

_“Will he forgive me?”_

_“He is a just man, Sansa,” Tyrion says, wants to go to her like that first night, “He will.”_

_Cannot tell her when, no matter how much he wants to.)_

\--

Tyrion was called back nearly two weeks earlier than scheduled to deal with the Iron Bank.

_(It always feels like it is the last time, always feels as if they are going from each other.)_

He left on a grey morning. Robb and Talisa and Catelyn joined her and Arya to see him off.

Before his men come to help him mount, Tyrion kissed her hand. Then he is on his horse, wistful eyes, solemn mouth. The Southern delegation clattered away. She goes up to the rampart to watch them snake down the queensroad until they disappeared over a distant, heather-thick ridge.

_(“Tyrion,” she says it, almost without thinking. His head is resting on her breast. It had been a hard day, a day of confession and tears. He leaves tomorrow, maybe forever. This is her fear: Arya away. Jon exiled. Theon dead. Brienne and Tyrion south in a whole other country. All the people who love her, not the Queen, not the little dove, not her body, not Alayne, not the Ice Maiden of Winterfell, but her, Sansa Stark, will be gone. His head lifts, she cannot read his eyes. It had truly been a very hard day. The words slip easily from her, “I love you.” She can see the shift, the intensity of his eyes. “I am in love with you.” For such a beautiful, complicated man, he is terribly easy to understand. She whispers it against his lips, “I love you.”_

_She knows she is trapping him, tries to make it better, “I am so, so sorry.”)_

\--

_(He goes to Talisa before he goes. She’s in the glass gardens again, face turned to the sun filtering few the panels. Like a sunflower, he thinks, lovely and bright and warm. She must miss Volantis’ sunshine._

_“Princess Talisa,” he says, by way of greeting._

_She starts slightly, smiles, “Oh, it’s you.”_

_“Yes. I just wanted to bid you farewell in person.”_

_“That’s good of you,” she looks at him expectantly._

_“I did not tell the Queen what you said,” he says, for lack of anything else._

_She does not look concerned, “I supposed you wouldn’t, I should not have said it. It was unkind.”_

_He nodded. She cocks her head, “I am sorry about that, by the way.”_

_He frowns, “Princess—”_

_She waves a hand, “I understand. Secrets are hard to keep if you speak of them, trust me, I know.”_

_He supposes she does._

_“But still,” she continues, “I am sorry, all the same, for you both.”)_

\--

He looked back briefly. Could never stare for long. He can see her, a black mark amongst the grey stone of Winterfell. If he felt fanciful, perhaps a smudge of auburn. She was standing on a parapet, watching them go.

He had a sudden flash of panic, the sudden urge to turn back.

‘The lone wolf dies. You know what to do.’ Bran’s note burned in his breast pocket.

Looked at Sansa, growing ever smaller, as his horse trotted down the road through the fragrant heath. Hoped that he had not made a dreadful mistake.

_(“Tyrion,” he lifts his head. They had pushed each other today. Pushed and pushed and pushed. Sansa had picked at the scabs on his heart, picked and picked, until it felt like a hemorrhage. Tysha, Shae, Joanna, Tywin, Daenerys, all his ghosts spilling out of him like entrails. He lay against her heart, it beat steadily. He tries and fails and tries again to hate her. “I love you.” It feels like a salve, like she is smoothing bandages over his bloodied heart. He searches her face for any hint of a lie. For all her tricks and schemes, Sansa is still a terrible liar. Her eyes are bright. There’s no falsity there. “I am in love with you.” It’s overwhelming, like an ocean or a river or a waterfall or something, anything that is good and cleansing and wonderful to behold. She leans down to kiss him, “I love you,” she murmurs. He pulls back and her eyes are sad, “I am so, so sorry.”_

_He’s not.)_

_\--_

_(She turns to go, must keep going, going, going._

_She sees Petyr, wind-whipped, standing by stairs on the way back into the castle._

_“Come on, sweetling,” hand extends to her, like he is beckoning her back to bed, “There is much to be done.”)_

\--

That afternoon they held a council meeting.

Lord Manderly is subdued, dully read his report up of the Northern trade deals—

_(The night before Jon leaves, she says, “You still have not told them, Jon.”_

_“I just want to be brothers a little while longer.”_

_“Oh, Jon, you’re always our brother.”)_

_\--_ and Southern trade deals—

_(The night before Tyrion leaves, they sit in her solar, and she says, “We will arrange a conference for my mother and brother to meet with Bran.”_

_Signs the last of their agreements with a flourish._

_“Of course, I will arrange it with the council and write to you when I have word.”_

_She sighs, “It will not be too long then.”_

_He reaches for her hand, “No, not too long.”_

_She kisses his knuckles. Runs her thumb over it as if to make it stick. Then lets it go.)_

\--and when Lord Manderly finished, Lord Glover just had to say, “I have just a few suggestions, Lord Manderly.”

_(He and Lady Flint are enjoying Manderly’s disfavor a little too much.)_

Robb arrived after the reports, “I apologize for my lateness, I was reviewing the new lumber arrangements with the Forrests.”

_(That had been a sheepish moment when she had sat down with him, shown him Lady Flint’s list, the checkmarks, the circles, the little notes in the margins._

_“You truly did not want me to be king,” he murmurs. He’s not angry, not anymore, just vaguely sad, and it sends her to pieces._

_She shows him, next, the real tithing requests and trade deals and even the most recent marriage offer from Cousin Robyn._

_“It can be overwhelming, the papers,” she says quietly, “I have a system that makes it quite simple—”_

_But he holds up a hand to quiet her. She does. Quickly. He looks mildly appalled at what he’s reading, “Does Lord Tyrion know you have two spies dedicated solely to him?”)_

Sansa stood, extended her hand, “May I introduce Prince Robb, the Young Wolf of the North, Hand to the Queen.”

Robb nodded, sat. Jeyne smiled sweetly, Lady Flint lifted her chin approvingly, Lord Glover smirked, and Lord Manderly patted his arm.

“Alright,” Sansa said, “What’s next?”

\--

_(When he’s done reviewing the first stack, he turns to her and says, “What about the lords you turned against me?”_

_In another’s mouth, it would sound accusatory. But Robb is too like Jon, too like Ned. It just sounds like the truth._

_“They will take time.” She means herself, of course, the Tallharts could care less._

_She pauses, bites her lip, then says quietly, “There will be those who try to betray you again.”_

_He sighed, “I know. The price of power.”_

_She pursed her lips, looked to her left as if she is going to see her father, one or the other._

_“Next time,” she stutters, “Well, Robb, you see—”_

_“What?” he says, impatient, he’s already moving to the next stack._

_“Whenever I am faced with a problem, like a betrayal, for example, I play a little game.”_

_She hesitates, cuts off in the middle of a sentence, lets it hang, dangle like a plum ready to be plucked._

_He is staring at her, hard, unyielding, all Stark. But he nods, curious, “And?”)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and that's a wrap. :0
> 
> I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS IS OVER. I am so, so grateful to everyone who has engaged with this story. This is the first creative writing project I've taken on in YEARS. I began writing it as a coping mechanism for my anxiety/depression, really for myself, and made an account to post it on a whim and to see anyone reading or commenting AT ALL is pretty incredible. You are all so kind. So, thank you, thank you, thank you. <3 <3 <3 
> 
> I'm also putting up the prologue to the second part of this series. I am still writing it but I finished that chapter this morning and I couldn't wait to post it. <3

**Author's Note:**

> This is a plot bunny that just has not left me alone. The thing is...um...I don't really DO plot, typically. Quarantine is forcing me to try new things! But I've made sure to leave plenty of room for Sanrion angst and pining because that is much more my comfort zone. I am also putting my history degree to good use because S8 just is full of references to 16th-century English foreign policy and I just can't not geek out about it. 
> 
> Title and most chapter titles from Johnny Flynn's "The Lady is Risen."


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